Tiffany Lombardi

"Does she have a gun?" When home is a crumbling camp surrounded by walls, checkpoints, and men with Kalashnikovs, maybe that's not a weird question to ask about your art teacher. Painter and multi-media artist Tiffany Lombardi spent almost two years teaching art to children living in the often dangerous Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. Lombardi, a Seattle native who has resettled in New York, talks about the barriers, both literal and cultural, she had to cross to gain the children's trust during her stay in the camps. The project culminated in a large-scale screen print called My Home, My Community, made by the children themselves. Lombardi discusses what life is like for kids in the camps, the art scene in Beirut, the inescapable nature of politics in Lebanon, and why a dress is sometimes more than a dress (32 minutes).