Enter Gabrielle Shannon, editor of the arts-and-culture Webzine Urban Desires. "As a child, I was nurtured by my exposure to the arts in New York City schools. Now I have the pleasure of working with some of the city's most talented artists and photographers. Last year, I began looking for a way these remarkable people could introduce some New York children to the arts."

The result was a deceptively simple project called Through the Eyes of a Child. Gabrielle started by asking professional photographers "if they could devote 10 hours a month to one-on-one mentoring of a kid." Twelve quickly agreed. She then located twelve children, of various ethnicities, "who might benefit from being involved with something new. They come from all parts of the city. Some of them suffer from learning disabilities or attention-deficit problems, others are just very shy." The logistics proved to be a bit complex, because some of the families had no telephones. In other cases, siblings insisted on coming along. Next.