This is our Boston
Students said postcards never reflect the neighborhoods they live in. They said there is more to their city than swan boats, the gilded dome of the State House, and the cobblestone sidewalks of Louisburg Square.
Three short sentences grace the back of the postcard.
''I am Angelo, and I'm in eighth grade. I live in Dorchester. This is MY Boston."
The photo shows Boston's skyline as seen from the top floor of a building from the city's largest and most diverse neighborhood. Angelo Pino, 15, took the shot to show the world the Dorchester that he knows and loves.
He is one of a group of young students who are documenting their city in photographs that show Boston the way they see it when they catch the bus to school or hang out with their friends. Through an after-school program called Citizen Schools, the photographs are turned into postcards that the students send to Boston lawyers, politicians, and developers.
The students said postcards sold at museums and tourist attractions never reflect the neighborhoods they live in. They said there is more to their city than swan boats, the gilded dome of the State House, and the cobblestone sidewalks of Louisburg Square.
The teens focus their cameras on the architecture and curvy streets of Mattapan, Roslindale, and Hyde Park. Pino said the point is to introduce people who never see these neighborhoods to a slightly different perspective: something these students believe is authentically Boston.
''I think [professional postcard makers] take pictures of what they think other people might like instead of what they see," said Pino, who made his postcard last spring and is now a Burke High School freshman. ''I take pictures of what sticks out to me where I live or about my neighborhood."
Judging from the reaction of some of the people who have received the postcards, the students are making some headway.
''I thought, 'Oh my God, I have not been in Dorchester in years and years and years and I'm surprised it looks like that,' " Claire McGuire, a partner with Ropes & Gray, said of the postcard she received last spring, which showed a Dorchester park surrounded by graceful three-deckers. ''I guess I expected it to be more thickly settled than that picture depicted. It looked like a suburban neighborhood. It didn't look that different from parts of Brookline."
Ted Landsmark, president of the Boston Architectural Center, cited the teens' unique perspective.
''Young people have a way of looking very objectively and naively sometimes at the activities that adults often consciously overlook," said Landsmark, who received a postcard from Mattapan.
And that is the point, said Gretchen Schneider, a Boston architect who created the postcard project.
''I was thinking about the huge discrepancies of the postcard pictures of Faneuil Hall and Cheers Bar and that's great, but there's so much more to Boston than that," said Schneider, who teaches architecture at Smith College. ''They [the teens] really are seeing their Boston. This is what they find interesting about their neighborhoods. I hope people get a sense of that."
Pino said some people assume Dorchester is mostly nonwhite, and therefore incorrectly associate it with crime or poverty. Maybe that explains why he had never seen a postcard featuring Dorchester until he made one, he said. Pino said he hopes his skyline pictures open up some minds.
''It's not a perfect city and it has its ups and downs, but there are good things about it," he said.
Shamonique Purvis, 13, said she struggles to understand why people do not pause to take a deeper look at her neighborhood, which is why her postcard photo includes the multilingual sign hanging outside the Hancock Market in Dorchester.
''I did this so I could show that I have Cape Verdeans, Portuguese, Spanish, and Arabic people living in my neighborhood," Purvis said.
Citizen Schools approved Schneider's idea earlier this year. Since then, 10 middle school students have worked on the project. Some, like Pino, have returned as mentors for this year's students. Jamara Wakefield, a freelance photographer, teaches the teens the finer points of her craft in their twice-weekly meetings at Codman Square.
After discussing lighting, visual clues, and lines, the teens occasionally practice on professional cameras. But for their assignments, they use Kodak disposable cameras -- not the best option for professional-level shots, but the only cameras the group can afford. After developing the photos, Wakefield leads the students through critique sessions, during which they select the most intriguing images for the postcards.
''You've got to tell your story, your perspective to someone who has no clue," Wakefield told her charges three weeks ago. ''Your pictures are a part of history. As Dorchester changes, people may never see what you see in Dorchester ever again . . . . These images are valuable."
Wakefield led the class through a 20-minute critique on the pictures Hugo Desius, 13, took of the three-deckers on his block.
Lined up side by side, the photos offered a panoramic view of the unique wooden architecture Dorchester is known for, Wakefield said. They focused on steeples and cracks that busy people might not notice, she said.
''The way you take pictures is like your thumbprint," she told Desius. ''It is really uniquely how you see things."
One of Desius's shots showed a tree growing outside the Dorchester Courthouse. The tree was framed by vividly green grass; the leaves cast playful, noontime shadows against the building.
This is Desius's Dorchester.
''I pass by this almost everyday to catch my bus to school," Desius said. ''I think it is a nice spot."
The group has nearly finished selecting postcard images, which will be printed next month and probably distributed to libraries. Eventually, Citizen Schools hopes to sell the postcards to raise money for teen arts projects.
Boston immigration attorney Lorne Fienberg, who received a postcard of a Dorchester three-decker, thinks they would sell. Quickly.
''They come to us," Fienberg said. ''We only rarely go to them and we should do it more. This was a pictorial way for them to say this is our Boston as opposed to yours."
Adrienne P. Samuels can be reached at asamuels@globe.com. 