2nd Annual ‘A Show’

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

2nd Annual A Show celebrates the work of emerging artists and collectives from across the city

CONTACT:
Platform A: Liz Forsberg | liz@artstarts.net | 416-953-0981
Toronto Arts Council: Kerry Swanson | kerry@torontoartscouncil.org| 416 392 6802 x209

June 11th, 2015

TORONTO – Platform A partner organizations Arts for Children and Youth, Art Starts, Jumblies Theatre, and SKETCH and CUE are proud to present the artistic work resulting from 48 grants made possible through City Council’s increased investment to the Toronto Arts Council. The A Show exhibition takes place Thursday, June 18th at SKETCH’s Creative Hub in Artscape Youngplace, and features visual art, live music, literary performances, fashion, video, and community art projects.

The Platform A initiative was launched in 2013 with $1,000 grants awarded to emerging underrepresented, marginalized, and newcomer artists and collectives to develop new projects with professional mentorship and organizational support. A Show features artistic work that engages residents across the city in diverse art forms at a local, grassroots level, and marks the culmination of the second round of funding from the Platform A initiative, which is in its second year of a three-year commitment of over one-million dollars.

“That the Toronto Arts Council has recognized the need to make arts grants more accessible and inclusive to the many diverse artists in our city represents a huge step forward in Toronto’s evolving arts and culture,” says Phyllis Novak, Artistic Director of SKETCH. “A Show is a demonstration of the art that is possible when a major arts institution partners with community-based groups to make funding available on the street-level.”

For a complete list of artists and projects supported, please see: http://platformatoronto.com/micro-grant-recipients-2014-15/

WHO: Platform A
WHAT: A Show
WHEN: Thursday, July 18th, 6 – 11 p.m.
WHERE: SKETCH Creative Hub at Artscape Youngplace, 180 Shaw St. Lower Level

Platform A is a collaboration between four of Toronto’s leading community arts organizations: Arts for Children and Youth, Art Starts, Jumblies Theatre, and SKETCH with CUE. These organizations have all emerged from grassroots initiatives to become key community builders in Toronto’s arts sector, engaging thousands of children, young people and adults annually through diverse and accessible programming. Each is committed to mentoring and partnering with new practitioners to ensure equitable opportunities for building careers and broadening public experiences in arts and culture. In 2015 $48,000 in funding was disseminated through this initiative. For more information, please visit http://www.platformatoronto.com

About Partner Organizations:

Arts for Children and Youth (AFCY)
Celebrating 20 years, AFCY is an award-winning organization whose mandate is to engage young people living in priority neighbourhoods in high-quality, accessible arts educational programs that are meaningful, relevant and collaboratively developed with community and education partners. AFCY positions arts programs in schools and neighbourhood venues as a means of building community, and empowering marginalized children and youth to reach their full potential as artists and social contributors.
http://www.afcy.ca

Art Starts
Art Starts is an award-winning charity that creates vibrant Toronto neighbourhoods through community-building arts initiatives. They inspire long-term social change in Toronto’s underserved neighbourhoods. Art Starts uses the arts to engage residents, collectively work to overcome challenges and create a shared sense of identity. Their collaborative approach to art-making celebrates communities, nurtures resiliency, cultivates life skills and inspires personal growth.
http://www.artstarts.net

Jumblies Theatre
In operation for over ten years, Jumblies is an inclusive and community-focused inter-disciplinary company offering multi-year residencies, studio training, mentorships, and innovative collaborative projects. Jumblies is an award-winning organization increasingly cited as a pioneering and inspirational example of art that embraces and intertwines aesthetics with social engagement.
http://www.jumbliestheatre.org

SKETCH and CUE
SKETCH is a nationally recognized, award-winning community arts enterprise based in Toronto engaging young people living homeless and on the margins, ages 16-29, coming from across Canada. SKETCH creates equitable opportunities for diverse young people to experience the transformative power of the arts, build leadership in the arts and cultivate environmental and social change through the arts.
http://www.sketch.ca

A collaborative partner of SKETCH, CUE is a radical arts initiative dedicated to supporting new generation artists who live and work on the margins. Since 2008, CUE has disseminated over $220,000 to support the creation of 220 art projects in multiple disciplines.
http://www.cueartprojects.ca

TORONTO ARTS COUNCIL
Toronto Arts Council, an arm’s length body of the City of Toronto, funds artists and arts organizations across the city through its grants programs. In 2013, Toronto City Council approved a funding increase of $4 million to Toronto Arts Council’s grants program.  In 2013, TAC disbursed nearly $14 million in grants to 1014 individuals, collectives, and organizations through its discipline and strategic initiative programs.
http://www.torontoartscouncil.org

AFCY: Bridging 

Our bridging projects enable AFCY to create unique connections between our programs in priority neighbourhoods and established art institutions such as our long time partners the AGO and the ROM and cutting edge arts organizations like DanceWorks and Urbanvessel. We are a building new partnerships and looking forward to building strong connections with the Ontario Science Center and Ripley’s Aquarium of Canada. Through these partnerships AFCY can bolster our programs but also create new opportunities like our Artist-Residencies where we place our emerging artists in unexpected locations from Toronto Botanical Garden to the Bata Shoe Museum. One of our Emerging Artists Tara says: “So many people passing by were telling me how cool the opportunity was and complimenting my work! The experience also made me realize how lucky I am to be creating art and working in the arts with unique opportunities.”
Above – AFCY Artist in Residency: Andrenne Finnikin using Dark Horse’s coffee and leftover coffee grounds to create her painting within the Dark Horse located near Spadina & Dundas.

The A Show

You are cordially invited to a celebratory showcase of Platform A grantees, mentorships, and partnerships.

Starting on Tuesday June 3, 2014 at 5:30pm, join us for  3 days of visual & interactive arts, video & live performances guaranteed to move you.

Exhibition Dates & Hours:
Wednesday June 4, Thursday June 5 – Noon to 8:00 pm
Friday June 6, Saturday June 7 – Noon to 6:00 pm

Location:
Jumblies Theatre
The Ground Floor
132 Fort York Blvd. (west of Dan Leckie Way)
For directions go to: http://www.jumbliestheatre.org/directions.html

Light Refreshments Served
For more information contact: info@jumbliestheatre.org, 416 203 8428
Visit our blog for details: http://www.platformatoronto.wordpress.com

AFCY: Basement Apartment Films

Basement Apartment is a collective of 5 emerging filmmakers from priority areas of Toronto. In weekly meetings, the members of the Basement Apartment shared resources and developed skills through workshops, targeted mentorship, and group work. Their goal is to apply these skills towards the promotion, production and distribution of a short film, which will be created with additional crew members and mentors from the community.

 

 

Through their combined network of contacts, they were able to reach out to many marginalized independent filmmakers that were happy to work on their film for the learning experience.

 

 

 

 

 

The participants outside the Basement Apartments collective are:

4 Actors

3 Camera Department

2 Sound Department

2 Production Assistants

1 Art Department

1 Set Photographer

for a complete production of 18 people.

After a workshop where they learned how to write character breakdowns and put up listings for actors, Basement Apartment Films was thrilled to receive an astonishing 297 applications for their film. This posed to be quite the challenge considering they only had spots for four actors, but they were able to pull it off!

 

 

 

 

“The biggest lesson we’ve learned is how to adapt to changing circumstances and limited resources – to be able to change as circumstances change, let go of preconceptions and see potential instead of disappointment. That will help us in any and every aspect of film-making in the future.” – Anthony Swan

We can’t wait to see the end result!

AFCY’s Camelle Davidson: Visual Expression

Camelle has so far conducted 8 workshops with 14 participants, which has exceeded her expectations. Community members have been actively involved and eager to participate.

When asked about anything positive or unexpected happening, Camelle answered:

“There were many positive things. This project allowed the parents of the participants to see firsthand how their children viewed their surrounding through art…The older youth have become more out spoken and have learned to express themselves through their art.”

“A few of my senior participants told me that this program has done a lot for them personally and mentally. They find it to be relaxing and very therapeutic. It has allowed them to be more socially active with the younger generation.”

“Platform A has allowed me to accomplish one of my many goals by giving me the funding to run an art-based workshop which I am very passionate about.”

Keep up the amazing work Camelle!!

 

AFCY: Platform A Micro-grant Recipients Announced

AFCY is one of 4 partners that are now each awarding micro-grants of up to $1,000 to up-and-coming emerging artists and collectives. Funded through the Toronto Arts Council, the micro-grants are part of a pilot project, called Platform A, that is testing new models for collaboration and resource sharing in the youth and community-engaged arts sectors.

AFCY is thrilled to announce the following micro-grant recipients:

Ascend Arts Collective: An art collective rooted in creativity, learning, sharing and enjoying the creation of art. Through weekly workshops facilitated by visual artist Felicia Samuels at the Ascend retail space, local youth will learn the basics of art creation, business development and event planning, with the opportunity to engage the community and test the market with their creations during a final showcase / pop-up shop.

Community Action Committee (Community Unite Project): By participating in a series of workshops in the Kennedy/Eglinton and  Birchmount/Eglinton area led by resident elders, resident high school students, and two youth group coordinators, youth will learn how they can create healthy community dialogues. They will each use this learning to make a personal leadership statement pledging their involvement to their community on a self-designed ceramic plaque that will be showcased at a Toronto Community Housing building in the community.

Camelle Davidson: An Inter-generational collective of community artists participating in weekly workshops at a Toronto Community Housing building in the Glendower community (Birchmount/Finch) to create various pieces of batik art based on themes that best represent them as individuals or as a community. Called Visual Expressions, the project will enable participants to develop and display artworks that tell a visual story about their community, city, life, history and what they have learned.

Leila Dey (Dey Dreamers Program): Dey Dreamers is an artist development program for young women between the ages of 15-29 who would not have access otherwise to professional music services. Over 10 weeks, the program will engage young women to develop as recording artists by participating in full-day sessions at Sandbox Studios, in which they will gain performance and recording skills from community artists acting as presenters and mentors. The program will result in a recorded compilation of songs, which will be shared with the community.

Fitzroy Facey (The 8:45:66 Initiative): A collaborative project bringing together three generations, for a first-of-its-kind music program in the Malvern community. This initiative brings together a father and sons trio (an 8-year-old child, a 25-year old youth and an adult), who will collaborate to create and record 3 original songs. The songs will be performed collaboratively with people living in Toronto Community Housing senior care facilities during a series of interactive events that include hands-on music/instrument making sessions followed by interactive group performances.

Junior Lavagesse (16 Bars: Jae Lejit Documentary): The 16 Bars Jae Lejit Documentary will raise awareness about artistic health, leadership and innovation through the creation of a documentary film/video that demonstrates the hip hop artist Jae Lejit’s creative process and his method of fusing music, visual imagery, and community-engaged artmaking. The film, which will include interviews from members of the Victoria Village community, as well as a “soundtrack” featuring musical imagery from AFCY artists, will be unveiled in an exhibition/screening in the community.

Casandra London (The Casandra London Network Youth Program): The CLN Youth Program is a community driven initiative fusing together the art of theatre and journalism for diverse youth making social and political differences in marginalized areas. Over the course of three months, youth will attend weekly workshops where they will learn how to collectively create a play, produce an online video news report, and develop an event to showcase their work in the community.

Anthony Swan (Basement Apartment Films): Basement Apartment is a collective of 5 emerging filmmakers from priority areas of Toronto. The collective works together with the aim of mitigating the barriers faced by economically challenged filmmakers to entering the film industry by creating opportunities for emerging film makers to take their careers and professional development into their own hands. In weekly meetings the members of the Basement Apartment collective will share resources, develop skills and knowledge (through workshops, targeted mentorship and group work) and then apply those skills to the promotion, production and distribution of a short film, which will be created with additional crew members, and mentors from the community. The short film will be screened at an event at Cinecycle.

Microgrant recipients to be announced Dec 10th!

Our review of applications for the Platform A Microgrant program is complete! Each organization, AFCY, Art Starts, Jumblies and Sketch/Cue have made their selections and after presenting names for approval we’ll be ready to release the names of artists/groups to the world on Tuesday December 10th – stay tuned! And to keep in the loop about announcements of the Microgrant recipients or other mentorship/internship opportunities as a part of the larger Platform A initiative please sign up to our respective newsletters and mailing lists.

Get news from:

AFCY   |  Art Starts   |   Jumblies Theatre   |   Sketch & Cue

New Microgrant Opportunity!

As a part of Platform A the partner organizations will be offering microgrants in amounts up to $1000 to support community engaged art making in Toronto! Read a little about each organization to see who would be the best fit for your application and contact them to apply today! Deadline Nov 15th 2013

Platform A

A place for shared information from the partnership organizations of Platform A. Art Starts – Arts for Children and Youth, Jumblies Theatre and Sketch along with Cue.