Long-running Vancouver program helps teens discover their creativity

Article content

“If they want us to gain appreciation for the exhibit, this is definitely working.”

The remark came from Bobo Lee Culham, 15, as he wrestled with a small, makeshift loom in the Vancouver Art Gallery (VAG).

Article content

Part of the Teen Art Group (TAG) program offered by the gallery and Emily Carr University, Lee Culham is one of 20 students, ages 15 to 18, who meet the first Thursday of every month at the VAG for an in-depth exhibit tour and workshop. Two weeks later, they meet again. This time at Emily Carr University to work with an artist and instructor.

Article content

When Postmedia visited the students during a gallery session, the group was learning basic weaving techniques from master weaver Sam Seward, from the Salish and Nanaimo First Nations. After the workshop with Seward, they went on a guided tour of the VAG exhibit Rooted Here: Woven from the Land, which celebrates the work of four prominent local Salish weavers: qʷənat, Angela George (səlilwətaɬ/Tsleil-Waututh); Chepximiya Siyam’ Chief Janice George (Sḵwx̱wú7mesh/Squamish); Skwetsimeltxw Willard “Buddy” Joseph (Sḵwx̱wú7mesh/Squamish); and Qwasen, Debra Sparrow (xʷməθkʷəy̓əm/Musqueam).

“I like working with this age group. It means a lot to me because they’ll remember,” said Seward, adding the key to the connection between himself and the students is simple. “We all want to learn.”

Now in its 18th year, the popular program gives students the opportunity to meet and talk with numerous working artists.

“They get so inspired by the variety of artists they meet, by the variety of ideas they encounter,” said Susan Rome, VAG program coordinator for schools and youth. “Most importantly, it is a success because programs like this give students the idea that there is possibility. They see how artists can make change in the world, and it speaks to them.”

Article content

Article content

The TAG program is also filling a void, as Rome points out school art classes are “quite limited now.” Many students also don’t have room in their busy academic timetables for an art class.

“My school doesn’t offer art programs, so this is a really good way to sort of engage with art for me,” said Coquitlam’s Imogen McMahon, 16, who attends Inquiry Hub Secondary School and has her eye on the animation industry.

Each month, the program offers up new exhibits and related workshops and instruction and the students gain access to a wide range of materials to work with.

“It’s nice to learn new things about artists that I wouldn’t discover myself,” said White Rock’s Sophia Coller, 16, who also took part in the VAG’s and Arts Umbrella’s Art Exchange program for younger students. “You get a lot more background information on the artists, which I really love.

“It’s also really cool to chat art with other people, as well.”

McMahon, now in her second year in the program, says it has “opened up new conversations about art and my potential future in art.”

Those conversations often begin in the exhibit portion of the program, where instructors offer a deeper dive into the works that are in the show.

Article content

“I went to the art gallery lots last summer and I did read the placards. But then in some of the early months of the Teen Art Group, we went over some of those exhibits and I was like ‘Oh, I didn’t actually know that,’” said Lee Culham, who is in his first year of the program and plans on returning next year. “You learn more in-depth things, which is nice.”

Kristina Fiedrich, manager of education initiatives for the continuing studies department at Emily Carr University, says the program also offers emerging artists a view into art as a career. And offers connections if students do plan to pursue that creative path.

“It kind of demystifies what it would be like to be creating work on a regular basis and developing better habits of mind. Like, if you want to be an artist it is actually a job. You have to really work at it,” said Fiedrich. “You have to appreciate the challenge of it and the pleasure of it at the same time.”

During the program, students also realize that a career in the art world is not just that of an artist.

“I didn’t know some of the jobs they had, like conservator, I didn’t know that existed,” said Lee Culham.

Article content

Program participants have gone on to different professions in the art and museum worlds over the years. Rome points to Sophie Yamauchi Lattimer, a former TAG student who went on to a career in arts administration and currently sits on the board of the Canadian Museums Association.

“She says it is all because of Teen Art Group,” said Rome. “So, you really don’t know where students will end up.”

The long-running program also acts as an icebreaker to the perceived world of austere museums and post-secondary institutions.

“They leave feeling an ownership to this place. They feel like it is theirs,” said Rome. “They know how to be in this space. And I think, when they go to other places in the world, they gravitate to galleries because they feel comfortable in those spaces now. I know because now this program is almost 20 years old, and we have former students who are bringing their own little kids to the gallery. So, we are absolutely creating lifelong learners.”

Registration for the next Teen Art Group will open in either June or July this year on the Emily Carr University website.

Article content

dgee@postmedia.com

twitter.com/dana_gee

Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don’t miss the news you need to know — add VancouverSun.com and TheProvince.com to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.

You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber: For just $14 a month, you can get unlimited access to The Vancouver Sun, The Province, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Vancouver Sun | The Province.

Article content