Culture pour tous

Social Arts in the Laurentians

 

How can art contribute to communities well-being? This is a question that those involved in ICI par les arts* constantly keep in mind. Ten years ago in Saint-Jérôme, a pilot project led to the setting up of a social arts centre. Since then, artists and facilitators have not stopped coming up with new ways to best respond to this questions. The centre has now become an important regional organization. It offers artistic activities throughout the Laurentians as a development tool for youths and adults facing challenges. Its mission is to educate, and to accompany and strengthen individual and community identity through arts and culture.

Through the arts, youths and students facing challenges and disadvantaged families learn how to strengthen their identity in order to take charge of their lives. How? Passionate artists and dedicated facilitators guide them in their artistic practices which help them to rebuild their lives and to reclaim their place in the community. For instance, PassionArt is a program geared at 16 to 25 year-olds which invites them to explore the social role of the artist and as a consequence to increase their engagement within the community.

“Both the school and health milieu call on our services. They want us to help youth facing challenges, and all these demands are addressed through a solution based on working with arts and culture,” states Jennifer Cooke the director of the centre. ICI par les arts is considered an important player in the social arts in the Laurentians region and has inspired several Canadian organizations dedicated to youth. “We even have schools from Montréal that seek us out because we are viewed as experts in social arts who know how to reintegrate youth at risk of dropping out of school,” she adds.

Through the years, the organization has maintained a steadily growing collaboration with the region’s school boards and social resources. Thanks to cultural projects, the centre’s educational component now reaches thousands of students in the Laurentians. Among these let us note Génie Arts, a project in which educators and artists work together to develop arts related activities as part of their school program. For example: how can one learn the history of New France? Through the creation of a stop motion film with the students. These new approaches have a remarkable impact on the students’ motivation and their academic outcomes.

ICI par les arts clearly plays an important role as a cultural mediator in the region. Not only does it stimulate youths to develop their intellectual capacities through a dynamic participation in the arts, it also heightens the emerging generations’ sensibility to culture. With its 12,000 square feet this largest employer of artists in the Laurentians provides an exhibition and performance space, studios for learning and perfecting skills in multimedia, woodworking, dance, music, theatre, photography... All of these are among opportunities through which artists and persons from all generations can encounter each other.

“We have groups of poets from 13 to 75 years of age here, who have come together thanks to one of our activities. We planted the seed. All these generations now mix and meet to discuss poetry,” says Jennifer Cooke in a playful voice. “With our cultural initiatives,” she adds, “we know how to reach ordinary citizens – regardless of age – in their everyday public spaces such as parks, and to give them the opportunity to become more familiar with different artistic expressions.”

The activities proposed by the social arts centre are growing each year thanks to the support of the municipalities and the region. “Because of our expertise in social arts and our work with youth we are often cited as an example in Canada. Yet, there are groups throughout Québec that do extraordinary things. To go further we need to exchange and share our experiences and to learn from one another. My aim is to gather these groups around a symposium on social arts,” Mrs. Cooke concludes with enthusiasm.

As a foretaste, ICI par les arts is organizing its first festival of social arts this summer in Saint-Jérôme. From July 14 to 19, artists and facilitators from the centre will encounter the public and propose all sorts of participative activities in the city and all the way out to the old train station.