I’m a Drawing and Painting Student at Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, and I’m the Youth Social Network Assistant at ArtBridges. From my perspective ArtBridging is a valuable tool. In fact, being a part of ArtBridges can be a metaphor for attending an art college or university.

As an artist, whether or not I go to school, I’ll be able to develop my talents and create. But learning in a vacuum is pretty inefficient, not to mention boring. Without my professors, my peers and the supplies that an art school can afford when we pile all our resources together, I wouldn’t have been able to reach the level of art-making that I’m at now.  When creating at school I’m aware of myself in terms of a group, and only then can I be an individual. When you’re alone you always think you’re original but when you end up seeing what everyone else is doing it’s shockingly similar to what you thought was original to you. Great minds think alike, sometimes a group of people have similar innate ideas but they’re only powerful if you work together to take these ideas to the next level and put them into action.

The starving, isolated artist is a very old and tired cliche that doesn’t hold up any more. Art wouldn’t be able to blossom

throughout time if everyone was hiding away and painting on their own. The communities within cities are what create movements that really inspire and create change. Without the impressionists hanging out in cafes in Paris, they wouldn’t have been able to break free from the norm and explore the essence of painting and seeing.

Community arts programs, organizations, projects and resources are so important, but the problem we’ve found with contacting them is that they don’t really know about each other. All of them have these great ideas that they want to share but they’re too busy and aren’t sure about how to connect and pool resources.

In my understanding, ArtBridges seeks to be that cafe that the impressionists used to hang out in and talk about their art. They solved their problems together and rejoiced at each other’s triumphs. Without that support system they wouldn’t be able to grow and have such a coherent identity. ArtBridges can be that art school where the experienced and the inexperienced can come together to teach each other and learn from one another.