It didn't take long for Jewel Van Valin's cross-country art project to take off.
Passengers flying in the difficult days after 9/11 were anxious and irritable because of tightened security and fewer flight amenities. The Delta Air Lines flight attendant wanted to do something about it.
So Van Valin reached back to an earlier time -- her kindergarten years -- and pulled out the Crayolas.
"I just put the mats on their trays and threw a crayon down, and the passengers immediately got it," she said.
For six years, travelers on Van Valin's planes have sketched their way over the continent and the Pacific, creating thousands of fanciful, vividly colored crayon drawings on the backs of beverage cart covers.
Van Valin has kept them all. And now she's looking for a place for her unusual collection to land.
"Many of these are very good. They should be on display. A broader audience should see them. Behind every one of these pictures is a story," she said.
Toward the end of each flight, Van Valin and other crew members tape passengers' drawings to the aircraft's bulkhead so everyone on board can see them. She also maintains a revolving display of the pictures in Delta's employee lounge at Los Angeles International Airport.
But she's still trying to find a permanent home for the artwork at LAX.
A few weeks ago, Delta staffers staged a guerrilla gallery in the terminal's corridors, posting passenger drawings on walls and support columns between Gates 56 and 59. They took down the unauthorized artwork at day's end, however, so it would not be confiscated and destroyed by airport officials.
Travelers' reaction to the impromptu show was enthusiastic. The sketches helped brighten the attitudes of passengers soured by "the hassles of going through security," said Ken Gomez, a flight attendant manager for the airline.
For Van Valin, the drawing project was an antidote to the fears and hassles of post-9/11 air travel.
"In the past, people would laugh and enjoy flying, but 9/11 changed a tremendous amount of things," said the 54-year-old, a veteran of three decades of flying.
"It's not as fun now as it used to be."
The idea for the artwork came to Van Valin as she distributed paper place mats to passengers when cutbacks had ended Delta's use of linen tray cloths.
