PostSecret founder Frank Warren comes to town
“Hi, my name is Frank, and I collect secrets.”
In the near-to-sold-out mainstage theater at the University at Buffalo Center for the Arts on Thursday, you could hear the crowd go silent as Frank Warren, the founder of PostSecret – an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a postcard – walked out onto the stage.
His friendly aura made the whole room warm right up as he began explaining his story. The project was started by Warren in 2004 when he began giving out postcards on sidewalks in his community in Washington, D. C. People were instructed to mail to his house a secret they had never revealed to anyone which can now be found on the PostSecretblog (post-secret. blogspot.com). The site started in 2005 after the project became much more than simple.
Soon enough, Warren was receiving secrets not just from the Washington, D. C., area but from places such as Texas, Seattle, and London.
The All-American Rejects contacted Warren in 2005, offering him $1,000 in exchange for use of secrets in their music video for the song “Dirty Little Secret.” Warren refused, but said that he would give them postcards in exchange for a $2,000 donation to 1-800-SUICIDE, a suicide helpline that Warren had been operating. They agreed.
Warren is very passionate about the subject of suicide prevention; he has raised more than half a million dollars for the cause: “The children almost broken by the world become the adults most likely to change it,” he said.
After Warren told his story, he invited people up to three microphones placed strategically around the room to share their secrets. People started running to be the first in line. As these people told their stories, it was completely silent. There were stories that made everyone laugh, and stories of utter tragedy. The last secret of the night was truly uplifting: “I mailed you a secret about three years ago when I first heard about PostSecret. Since then, I have changed for the better. That secret was about the kid I used to know. Now I’m happy, and that happiness is going to change the world.”
At the very end of the presentation, a four-minute video was shown with music and secrets being read aloud as the crowd sat in silence. As the last slide played and people read the quote on it, everyone started to applaud: “There are two types of secrets: those we keep from each other and those we keep to ourselves.”
As Warren walked off the stage, he was given a standing ovation.
Alyssa Frey is a junior at Clarence.
