Grantee Stories
Healing and Strengthening Communities Through Art
Sarah Bernhardt grew up in a family focused on loving their neighbors and serving the people around them. With her dad a Lutheran minister and mom a special education teacher, it seemed natural for her to pursue a similar career.
“My parents definitely shaped the way that I thought about my work and how I would contribute and serve in my life,” Bernhardt says.
Today Bernhardt is serving the St. Louis, Mo., community of Gravois Park—through art. The 29-year-old artist and professor of art at St. Louis University began reaching out to neighbors of Holy Cross Lutheran Church with a weekly art class, which led to her founding Intersect Arts Center (IAC).
In 2018, We Raise Foundation awarded Bernhardt an Emerging Leader Grant for her work in creating IAC’s Camp Resolve, an arts camp with a different type of curriculum: conflict resolution.
