Art Academy in hospital On children's art works exhibition in the Republic clinical hospital in Moscow "Russian Thought" (Parisian newpaper), 1996 Half a year ago Anna Gnoyenskaya, painter and parishioner of Saint Kosma and Damian church in Shubin, came to the hospital with the only will - to help children. Physicians and lyric poets, scientists and writers - all of them, as a rule, become nurses and maids. In other words, they do any necessary work. And that is fair. Here we serve, first of all, with one gift - gift of peaceful samaritan. But Anna Gnoyenskaya understood that she could help these children not only being a nurse, but also as a painter. She began to gather children in a playing-room and to teach them painting. She brought markers, colors, pencils, etc. That was the beginning of the Art Academy work. The result of this activity surpassed all expectations. Children, that are usually very weak and don't bear math or Russian language lesson (even short in time), have been painting for hours. Painting has replaced a lot of activities in their life. Deprived of normal life, prisoners of the hospital for ages, children express all their feelings on paper. Not being capable to do the things that normal children do - to run, to jump, to go info sports, etc.- young painters express their inner world through colors, light and forms. Hostages of the terrible illness, they get through their pictures to life. And the most wonderful is that the world of their works is amazing, they don't see it in dark colors but light and colorful! Of course, a very important thing is that people who help children here are Christians. Light of their faith defines atmosphere of the hospital. An abode of sorrow becomes Noah's Ark where songs, jokes and laugh are ordinary thing. But crying is also often here - death of a child is always awful. But Christians know that death is not the end, and that is the most important. You cannot tell it to a mother that lost her child. But children themselves understand it very well. Strange as it may seem, they get used to it quicker than the grown-ups and talk about it as if it were something ordinary. Every day somebody dies there, but children are not hypnotized by death, they see life and they reach out for it. Life is what they paint. Faces of people on their pictures are always alive and unique, animals seem to speak with you in human language and even grass and trees have heart. And it becomes clear why God asked Adam to give names to all the animals and plants in paradise. Every week in the hospital of the Theotocos Pall church, that is made by the Charity group in activity Hall, father George Chistyakov celebrates liturgy. And every time the hall is full of children and their mothers. Here they take force to fight the disease, they learn not to be afraid of death and to love HE, WHO with his death gave us eternal life. Looking at children with love (it isn't possible to do it otherwise), the group coordinator says about them: "They are our Jesus Army". And indeed this is true! But let's return to the children's exhibition. It is amazing, after all. At the opening ceremony teaches of the Art school empathized high professional level of the works, saying that even pupils of special art schools don't usually reach such a level. American Charity organization published a special album of children works from the Republic hospital. The album is entitled "Let children come to Me". It unites works on the Bible themes.And once again there is an amazing fact: when children paint the scenes of Jesus Passions: Hefsimania, Way to the Cross, Crucifixion, they don't paint in dark colors but bright. The reason is that they see victory of life and not of death because it is not only from books that they learnt about it. And though some of the children names that you see beneath pictures are outlined in black, their works are evidence of life. Near the thier works there are works of Anna Gnoyenskaya, who gives so much time and heart to children (one may wonder how she manages to find time for her own works). She is former student of Surikov school that gave its hall for the exhibition. Anna's works explain everything: there is the same triumph of colors, energy of manner and the same craving for life that is so amazing in the works of her pupils. The main theme of her works are flowers (there are wonderful and bright still-lives in the Impressionists manner) and Temples that tell us about her love to children and God. The painter is very young yet - her glory and success are in the future. But the main thing is clear: the way is chosen correctly - devotion to God and people through beauty. And that what she teaches in the hospital. Many of the children after coming back home continue to paint.