« Robin Sutherland is an emerging arts manager and community artist who has recently moved from Toronto to her home community of Algoma, Northern Ontario, to establish Thinking Rock Community Arts, a new organization that will seek to engage and build community along the North Shore of Lake Huron. This blog will follow her journey along that path.

Robin Sutherland at Big Medicine Studio, Four Lands of Nipissing Project. Photo: Sherry Guppy.

I first started apprenticing with Ruth Howard and Jumblies Theatre at the beginning of December 2012, through Theatre Ontario’s Professional Theatre Training Program. I wanted to work with Jumblies to learn more about the process of engaging communities in the creative process, and also to gain some practical insights about starting a community arts organization.

So far I’ve learned concrete skills related to the production and facilitation of community arts projects, established a growing professional network of artists and collaborators in both southern and northern Ontario, and slowly started carving out my own method of practice by learning from the work of some of the leading practitioners in community arts from across the country.

Two of the projects I’ve been part of so far are the Artfare Essentials Workshop, and Ruth Howard’s micro-residency in North Bay and Nipissing First Nation.

Artfare Essentials Workshop
The Artfare Essentials workshop took place from December 6-12, 2012 in Toronto. The curriculum covered the principles and practices of community engaged art-making, including sustainability and legacy; ethics and aesthetics; financial management and budgeting; the creative process and vision; partnerships and collaboration; cross-cultural collaboration and more.

Participants came from around the world and a variety of sectors – from actors and educators to mental health and social work professionals – and so there were many perspectives to learn from.

After just one day of meeting each other, we were delving deeply together into our own fears and trepidations around doing community-engaged theatre work: the ethical considerations of working with communities that we ourselves may not be from; thinking critically about questions of representation; wondering whether, when and how we can tell someone else’s story; whether we have the courage to do this kind of work; how to survive financially, spiritually and emotionally in a career that is far from mainstream. All big questions!

Artfare Essentials Workshop. Photo: Katherine Fleitas.

In addition to the practical skills and insights gained throughout the process, the workshop involved tremendous opportunities for building friendships and partnerships, and also entailed serious self-reflection and deep thinking, leaving me feeling open and vulnerable, challenged and comforted all at once.

Four Lands of Nipissing
The second major project I was part of with the Jumblies mentorship was Ruth Howard’s micro-residency in North Bay and Nipissing First Nation. The project, The Four Lands of Nipissing, was an introduction to a longer residency project that will take place in September of 2013.

For this project we took over the Whitewater Gallery for the week, inviting the public into the gallery to have a cup of tea with us and share their Four Lands of Nipissing – the Badlands, the Goodlands, the Lostlands and the Dreamlands.

The Badlands represented things people didn’t like, or that had a negative impact on where they lived. The Goodlands represented positive, pleasurable or joyful elements. The Dreamlands were things desired for themselves and their community, and the Lostlands were spaces and elements from which they were separated by time or space.

In order to encourage the public to come by and engage with the project, we bought mismatched teacups and dropped them off throughout the city with tags that read « Please take me back to the Whitwater Gallery, 143 Main Street West, have a cup of tea and share a story! ».

Teacup for Four Lands of Nipissing. Photo: Robin Sutherland.

In the evenings, the residency moved to the Big Medicine Studio at Nipissing First Nation, where Penny Couchie and Sid Bobb run Aanmitaagzi. There we sat with groups of children and youth in nightly workshops, and invited them to relate to us through drawing what they felt was encompassed within their Four Lands. In this way we collected the stories of over fifty residents of the Nipissing area.

The week ended with a Winter Solstice celebration at the Big Medecine Studio, with all involved invited to come and see what had been collected and created throughout the week.

One of the best parts of this experience for me was being able to connect with northern artists Sid Bobb, Sherry Guppy and Penny Couchie from Aanmitaagzi as well as Clayton Windatt from Whitewater Gallery. The project also reconfirmed that, if asked, people will come together to share and create. Many people, from many places of knowing, will respond if they are invited, because this work is infused with the guiding principle that ‘everyone is welcome’. It seems simple, but it is elegantly true.

Artfare Essentials Workshop. Photo: Katherine Fleitas.

Thanks to the funders who made this project possible. Ruth Howard received funding activity through the Ontario Arts Council’s « Artists in the Community/Workplace » grant. Robin Sutherland participated through support from Theatre Ontario’s Professional Theatre Training Program, funded by the Ontario Arts Council. Aanmitaagzi’s participation was supported in part by the Ontario Trillium Foundation. Jumblies Theatre has recently received funding from the Canada Council for the Arts for the final phase of this project in September 2013. »

– Robin Sutherland, Founder and Artistic Director, Thinking Rock Community Arts
All photos courtesy of Robin Sutherland
robin.a.sutherland@gmail.com

Read Robin’s thesis ‘Community Arts and Social Change in Rural Northern Ontario’ here.

For ArtBridges/ToileDesArts sponsorship opportunities: Simon Constam, Sponsorship Director, simon.constam@gmail.com, 905-537-7227
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