FERGUS – What does community mean?
To the youth who participated in a series of art workshops at The Grove over the winter, community means love, safety and acceptance.
Their art show, held on March 25 at The Grove, displayed works with hearts, Pride rainbows and messages of hope and coming together.
Keira Dreyer, 16, thought of the 2SLGBTQI community as she worked on her project. Her artist’s description reads: If someone hurts you, still have your heart open. This is how the pain will find an exit.
“I want more people to see that’s important,” she said.
“You can’t change who you are.”
Dreyer said she was going through a break-up when she started working on her independent piece. The heart in her image is wrapped in bandages.
The message in Kaitlynn Kent’s piece is Love is Louder.
“LGBTQ rights are human rights,” the 22-year-old said.
“Be kind. Everyone wants a safe space.”
KAITLYNN KENT
Nicholas Bunch’s piece also featured a heart, but his had a background of colour block meant to represent a reel of film. And there’s an arrow in the heart.
“The heart represents a person, and the arrow represents the pressure of society,” the 12-year-old said.
“And the film reel represents the past. We should not forget that people have past issues.”
Rashmeet Kaur facilitated the workshop and guided the young people through the eight sessions.
They experimented with colour, tried painting and collage, and by the end the 10 youth had created individual works of art plus three group projects.
“I’m so proud of them,” Kaur said at the art show.
“I wanted them to think about community and what that means, but also to learn what expression means.
“Some of these youth have innate talent but all of them learned [self-expression]. And that’s really valuable.”
Nicholas Dischiavi volunteered as a peer mentor with the youth and said it was amazing to watch them gain confidence from one session to the next.
“At first they were quiet and cautious,” he said, adding they loosened up and became more comfortable with each other.
“The idea was to be very informal. Whatever they were feeling, we’d see where that took them. And now there’s this.”
The art will remain with The Grove – to hang on the walls at the Fergus site or at the other Grove sites in Wellington County.
NICHOLAS BUNCH
