Arts Explorer # 10: Community Arts Project: Speak Against Racism

The Community Arts Project was a big undertaking, but was fun and very rewarding at the end. I remember feeling a bit nervous at the beginning, because I was unsure of what the task entailed. We discussed issues that we were passionate about. But we couldn't think of something that we were collectively passionate about. We then got into a discussion about stereotypes, and whether or not we have experienced something that made us feel like we were being discriminated against. I then shared my experience in high school that made me feel like I was being stereotypes based on my nationality. I was in volley ball practice in grade 11, and one of the girls in my team came up to me and asked me where I was from. i replied that I am from the Philippines, and that I am Filipino. She then replied "haha! you're Filipino? Is your mom a nanny?". This angered me so much, and I thought it was extremely unfair and ignorant for her to say such a statement. The Philippines' largest export is labour, and a lot of Filipinos who go abroad are nurses, nannies, teachers, or waiters etc. I am so proud of them for going out into the world to find a better paying job, and sending their money back to their loved ones in the Philippines. I never felt ashamed of this. My father is a business man, and my mother is a house wife. Just because the majority of Filipinos abroad have jobs that I discussed previously, it is nothing to be ashamed about. The mere fact that she grouped all female Filipinos as being nannies, I thought, was very ignorant of her. 

Our Logo

After sharing my story to my group mates, they started sharing some stories of their own. This idea of raising awareness about stereotypes and discrimination, and help that people who are discriminated against can get started to take form. It took us days to solidify our big idea, but our main goal was to have an outlet for people who are discriminated against to voice their experiences, stories, or thoughts about what they have gone through. A lot of what we did as a group was brainstorm ideas of how we can get our message across, what our objective was, and the stakeholders we can contact. Once we came up with a solid idea, our project took flight from there. 

What do you believe in? 

I believe that it is not fair to stereotype of discriminate someone based on the colour of their skin, or their nationality. Stereotypical thinking such as "Asians cannot drive" is not only offensive, but is unfair, and people should be educated that these statements have no room not only in the Ryerson campus, but around the world as well. I believe that racists are ignorant and irrational. I believe that those who are discriminated against should voice their experiences, not only to get support from their peers and organizations, but also to educate those who think racism is not longer a problem in our society. 

How will you use the arts to communicate your BIG idea? 

Firstly, we had two parts to our big idea. The first part was to create stickers with a quote from famous thinkers, and their thoughts or comments that has to do with racism. Underneath the quote, we had a statement "Like (whoever said the quote), you have a voice. Share your story here". Then we had a link to a website: www.speakagainstracism.org. We then added our slogan which we all collectively designed, but was executed by our group member Tara. We also had a smart phone bar code that people can scan, which directly links you to the website. 

The second part of our big idea is the website. We had a rough image of our website that we presented to the class. The website is meant to be an interactive community where people can share their thoughts, experiences, ideas, comments, or feelings about racism anonymously. Then people can comment and provide support to that person. We also added a list of organizations including Ryerson's Student's Against Racism (the stakeholder we contacted), UofT's Anti Racism Office, Canadian Race Relations Foundation, and the Broken-Chains International. We then listed the support these organizations can provide for them such as joining a campaign, or having one on one counselling with a professional online. 

One of our stickers

Who will you involve? 

The people we decided to target this project towards are Ryerson Students. We wanted to start small, and since Ryerson is a multicultural university, we thought it would be appropriate. We then thought that if we were to further this project, we would reach out to other university students such as U of T. We talked to members of Ryerson's Students Against Racism at the Student Union building to pitch our idea. They thought it would be a great way not only to promote the organization, but to provide help and support to those who have been discriminated against. We also talked to Printek which is a business that prints stickers, stationary, and other office supplies to make our stickers. Since they they thought we were doing something good for the community, they decided to print our stickers for free.

Links to the our Stakeholders' Websites:

Ryerson University: http://www.studentsagainstracism.ca/

U of T: http://www.antiracism.utoronto.ca/

Canadian Race Relations Foundation: http://www.crr.ca/

Broken Chains International: http://www.broken-chains.org/

How will you persuade the community to support your project?

Our stickers were the first step to persuading the community to support our project, and to go to the website. We placed the stickers in several urban areas to promote our website, and for them to reflect about the quote. We also talked to the RSU's Students Against Racism to get some feedback. They liked our idea, and since it's the youngest of the 5 equity groups on campus, (it just started last year 2010), they thought it would be a great way to promote their services. 

Examples of where we would place our stickers to communicate our project

In the RSU's Board

On a post in Victoria Street where's there a lot of student 'traffic'

On a public telephone 

On a computer in the library

How do you think your presentation went? 

I was extremely nervous about the presentation. My friend Allan suggested we use a software to present our project, which was very different from the linear power point presentation. It twisted and turned, and were were able to incorporate some words into pictures. I thought it was a very creative way of presenting our idea. My knees were shaking, and I was very jittery during the presentation.However, I was very proud of what we did. We were able to community our thought process with the the audience, and we were descriptive and precise about our objectives, our big idea, the stakeholders, and different components of the presentation. I was proud of what we were able to come up with, and I thought our big idea was actually feasible and realistic. 

What could you have done differently? List comments/suggestions/questions from the class feedback

After hearing some of the other groups' presentations, I couldn't help but compare it to ours. I thought they did such an amazing job, and their big idea was a lot 'BIGGER' than ours. One group even had an idea of going to Uganda to film a child friendly documentary about child soldiers. I think we could have reached a bigger audience, bigger than Ryerson University. I also wish that we had more time so that Broken Chains and Canadian Race Relations Foundation could have contacted us, and gave us feedback about our project. Moreover, I think we could have given a brief definition of the different types of racism, and what stereotyping means, and that it is a form of discrimination. I think that if we did this, then people would understand the project more. 

Unfortunately, due to time constraints, we weren't able to get class or teacher feedback. However, I was able to ask my classmates after the presentation what they thought about out presentation. The feedback they gave was generally good. They liked the software we used to present the information, they thought it was cool and creative. Also, they like how organized the presentation was, and how we identified clear objectives, the stakeholders, and our big idea. I wish we could have gotten some constructive criticism though, so we know what we could have done better. 

This Community Arts Project forced us to open our minds, and unleash our creativity to promote something we are passionate about. Although the process was at times stressful, the end result was very rewarding!

Neesha, me, Elizabeth, Tara and Carmen holding up the stickers

This project can be translated into the Kindergarten classroom! Ask children what they are passionate, concerned, happy, or sad about. For example, the garbage lying around their school, or the pollution they have to inhale when they are outside. Allow them to think of creative ways to communicate their concern. Provide suggestions such as creating an art instalment and allow them to create works of art to symbolize their concerns. Display it out in the hallways, or allow parents to come in and look at their project. Maybe even post it on a blog or in the school website to reach a wider audience! Let your imagination run wild, but make sure it's developmentally appropriate for the children. 

Arts Explorer # 9: Guerilla Art

For this week's arts explorer, we were supposed to make guerilla art, also known as "street art". I found this task a little bit daunting at first because I am such a fan of this type of art and the artists that have influenced this type of art movement, such as Banksy. I watched a documentary about guerilla artists and street artists entitled Exit Through the Gift Shop. This documentary was very well made, and was truly inspiring. Banksy is a popular graffiti artists/ guerilla artists who spray paints political statements around the world, notably, in the separation barrier on the Palestinian West Bank. He only agreed to participate in the documentary if his face was blacked out. There's a lot of footage of him creating his art, and he gives an interview to the filmmaker about his ultimate goal of engaging people to think about the world through his artwork. 

This is what I believed guerilla artwork to be. A profound political statement with the use of spray paint, which I didn't feel creative or aware enough to do. I further researched the purpose of making guerilla art, and read that there is no one purpose of making guerilla art, popular reasons include making a statement, sharing ideas, to send good karma, or just plain fun. This made me a bit less nervous, and so I thought about the different things I could use, and the purpose of my guerilla art. Since I have never spray painted in my life, graffiti art was out of the question. I then decided to use an object and writing to convey my message. I decided that I wanted to send good karma to people, and to make them laugh after a long day at work. This is what I came up with:

Free Hugs from Spider Man!

I remember that my brother won a spider man stuffed toy last year in Canada's Wonderland, and it would always be the topic of conversations whenever my friends would visit my house. They would carry it and hug it because it was so cuddly, yet very bizarre. It also frightened some friends when they would come over at night, and it would be in the corner of the dining room starting at them. I decided to use spider man to capture people's attention, and to offer them a friendly hug when they would pass by the park in front of my apartment building. I thought it would be a great way to cheer them up after a long day of work, and to put a smile on their faces. I also thought it would be fun to see their reactions, and to see if anyone would actually want to hug him. I was also inspired by the free hugs campaign on youtube, and I thought it sent such a beautiful message. In today's fast paced society, people rarely stop and notice something, or do something other than their daily routines. The free hugs campaign sent a simple message, which was to make other feel better, and was a random act of kindness. Although Spider Man can't hug back, I think hugging THE Spider Man would be just as rewarding (haha).

I ventured out into the park on a sunny Wednesday afternoon just as people were coming home from work. I brought Spidey with me, and just to feel less insecure, I brought my sister Danni as my assistant. This is how we placed him on the park bench: 

Pretty snazzy huh? It looked like he was just hanging out, trying to catch some rays. I loved how unassuming he looked! The gentleman on the right looked at us like we had issues, but laughed when he saw the sign on Spider Man. I wasn't able to capture it though because my sister and I were both laughing. We 'hid' behind a tree and tried to look as unassuming as possible by snapping pictures of each other, and of the park. We waited for about 20 minutes, which was no problem because it was a beautiful sunny day. There were about 3 different paths in the park, and people rarely took the path that Spider Man was sitting in. Then suddenly: 

My sister called my attention to a businessman walking down our path! I quickly took a shot of him, good thing he didn't notice us. I was so excited, and I held my breath for bit hoping he'd come up to Spidey. Then the most amazing thing happened. These pictures are pretty self explanatory: 

He noticed it! This gentleman was talking on his phone, and I could hear him laughing! He stopped in front of Spider Man for a while, snapped a picture, then sat down beside him and took a picture of himself! It happened so fast, and I was so excited to be there to capture someone's reaction! It was all too perfect, and it felt so rewarding to brighten someone's day with a simple act. This guerilla art activity was so much fun to do, and so rewarding at the end. It made me feel proud and excited that someone actually noticed him. This giant stuffed toy is so much more than a conversation piece, or a frightening image in the corner of the dining room. Now, it is so much more than that, it brightened someone's day, even for just a moment, which is what I intended for Spider Man to do!

The art word for this blog is complementary and asymmetrical. Asymmetrical is defined by Schirrmacher and Fox (2009) as a balance that is unusual and intriguing, a dark colour may balance lighter ones. Moreover, complementary colours are opposite each other in the colour wheel, and provide a dramatic visual contrast (Schirrmacher & Fox, 2009). Since Spider Man is black and white, I wanted the FREE HUGS sign to stand out more, so I decided to use contrasting bright colours like highlighter yellow, outlined with red. This allowed for people to read the sign from far away.  

This activity can be translated into a Kindergarten classroom. Children can draw, paint, collage, mould, or construct an idea, a thought, a statement, or just something fun to place outside for people to see. My rigid misconception about guerilla art as something that had to be spray painted, and had to have a controversial political statement is totally defunct by reading more about the purpose of it, and the materials that can be used. Children can share their art outdoors to strangers, and this may brighten someone's day, and can be a very rewarding experience to them when it is noticed! 

References

Schirrmacher, R, & Fox, J.E. (2009). Art and creative development for young children (6^th Ed.). Belmont, CA: Delmar.

http://guerilla-art.wikidot.com/what-is-guerilla-art