Viola's New Look!

The air is getting crisper, I just made my first batch of apple sauce, and everyone's going back to school on Tuesday.  It's a time of year when you can literally feel the change happening, so it's a perfect moment to announce our official new logo!

Back in February, we took a good look at our logo that has been in use for at least 10 years, if not more.  You know the one.  Small girl looking up, arms outstretched, all in purple.  Maybe we hadn't really thought critically about it as a staff before, but we suddenly noticed that she didn't look much like our students.  We work with middle and high schoolers, and it became clear to us that our Viola girl had a "lower school" feel. 

And that's when we got the idea to hold a competition for self identified women in high school to re-imagine our logo for an older crowd.  A few weeks later, we emailed Holly Situ, a then senior at Whitney Young, to let her know she'd won $100 and our enduring admiration.

Holly provided this artist statement:

"I wanted to show more of the dramatic side of Shakespeare in the logo, and the famous Yorick's skull from the play, Hamlet was the first thing that came to mind. But usually, the skull is in the hands of a male actor. Instead, I depicted a confident young woman's silhouette striking a pose with the skull to show the Viola Project's mission to empower young women through performance. "

Thanks, Holly!