"Every little act contributes to the Big Picture, no matter what obstacles you have to face." -- Shanika Silva
She’s only 18, but Shanika Silva has already made a colorful impact on the lives of UTMB’s youngest patients. As an artist and advocate, she spearheaded “The Big Picture” project, which uses art to show children they can make a difference, regardless of how old they are or what obstacles they have to overcome.
Over the past few months, Shanika, a senior at Friendswood High School, set up easels and pastel paints in several clinics so pediatric patients who visited UTMB could help produce paintings featuring colorful underwater scenes. The idea was for the paintings to then decorate the clinic or patient-waiting area, giving the children a sense of ownership. She had assistance from Makaela Toliver, a sixth-grade student at Levi Fry Intermediate School in Texas City, and other volunteers to make it all happen.
“We would stay in the waiting room and ask patients if they wanted to color,” said Shanika, who found that it really helped ease their nerves and distracted them while they were waiting.
“I liked all the unique touches the kids did, too. Whenever they did something, they got really excited. Although I sketched the 
outline of the paintings first, the kids were creative and added things to it. For example, if you look at the octopus picture, a little boy drew a flower in there so the octopus is holding a rose.”
Anything was possible with the kids: pink grass, orange skies or purple fences. After everyone contributed, Shanika added some finishing touches and the paintings were framed and donated to the pediatrics clinic so that the patients could see their works of art displayed for all to see.
Shanika attended the ribbon cutting for the new Galveston clinic on 61st Street, where several of the paintings now line the walls.
“It’s nice to see them all nicely framed,” she said. “It makes
the clinic really colorful and it goes well with all the other artwork. I hope the kids feel proud about what they did and what they accomplished when they come in and see it.”
Shanika’s mother is Dr. Gayani Silva, a professor of pediatrics at UTMB. She says Shanika proposed “The Big Picture” idea to Dr. Kwabena Sarpong, the medical director of the Galveston-based pediatric clinics, who immediately agreed to the project. Silva says she is proud of her daughter, who has been interested in helping others since she was 6 years old and the family took a trip to an orphanage in Sri Lanka.
“Little as she was, she felt compassion for others and immediately sold her toys to send money back to the orphanage when we got home,” she said. “To this day, that experience seems to motivate her to go out of her way to do things like this. However busy she is, she seems to find time for advocacy. She has developed a lot of leadership skills and I am very proud of her and know that she will continue this work.”
Shanika raised funds in order to get frames for the paintings. She credits her long-time art teacher, Betsy Miller from Colors of the Heart art studio, with providing supplies for the project, such as paper, pastels and easels.
“The Big Picture” project is housed under a non-profit organization called Revive to Survive, which was founded by two of Shanika’s friends who are pre-med students. Before the project in Galveston, Shanika recruited volunteers to complete “The Big Picture” project with pediatric cancer patients in Sri Lanka. All the paintings were displayed and prints of the patients’ paintings were sold to raise money for vital medication.
For more information on "The Big Picture," go to www.revivetosurvive.org/our-projects/the-big-picture.