We gave the following assignment to the young artists from around the world:

Like Pompeii in Italy, imagine, without warning, a volcano erupted where your class lives and totally covered up all evidence of life. Then imagine, for whatever reason, the world forgot all about your community. One thousand years from now, archeologists rediscovered your community but, try as they might, they only found a small collection of surviving artifacts.

This year, we are asking your class to come up with this collection of objects, each item of which reveals something important and/or meaningful about your way of life. You and your classmates must individually select one of these artifacts and then paint or draw culturally revealing scenes that feature that artifact in use.