Tiffany Glass Ferreira

       In 2007 I was a new mom, working full time for the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts as a program coordinator to create opportunities for talented youth. I wanted to find a way to fit a little art back into my own life so I began painting on 2”x2” canvases – and it became easy to find four square inches of quiet in each day.
After accumulating more than 50 canvases, I decided to leave them for strangers to find and keep. Creative friends heard about the project and offered their support. The Real Small Art League began with the collaboration and cooperation of these busy artists, recent graduates and closet artists. Visual artists, writers and musicians were encouraged to post work in an acceptable public place, including a note, asking the finder to visit our website and respond. On the website, we published images of the posted work, a roster of the participating artists and public responses. We learned how to create the website from a C3 workshop led by Slash Coleman. By 2008, the Real Small Art League grew to include artists participating in Singapore, England, Caribbean Islands, New York, Portland, The Outer Banks and Kalamazoo, Michigan.
In September 2009, we created a placement exhibition called the Real Small Art geocache – a GPS positioned container full of creative items, available for trade. There are more than 900,000 geocache containers around the world, like a giant treasure hunt with technology tools. Our creative cache is a tribute to the first art exhibit in Bon Air, Virginia, in 1903. In addition, more than a dozen artists are currently placing art in geocaches around the world.
In 2010 we launched “Free to a Good Home”, an effort to send more than 500 paintings to nominated recipients. Artwork is mailed with a note explaining the project , and a request for their feedback. We collect responses like this: “It’s hard to pin point those random acts of kindness in today's society, but Real Small Art is the essential definition. It's amazing to physically hold that act of kindness. It hangs next to our door as a reminder to pass on our own act of kindness to others. It also inspires me to be grateful for the little things in life.”
You are invited to visit realsmallart.com and nominate someone, to express love, appreciation, kindness or creativity. Help us spread creative gratitude and artistic kindness. We believe a little work of art can go a long way.