J’adart: For the Love of Art

Wednesday May 11th, GCTC, 6-9pm

Do you enjoy an evening soirée? Then come join us! Every year we host our fabulous annual fundraising party, J’adart: For the Love of Art to raise money for our Community Outreach Program and our Bursary Program. This celebration brings together arts patrons, OSA members, students and teachers, Board members and lovers of art and culture to support our efforts and celebrate our student’s accomplishments.

 

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With our Motto, “Teaching art to everyone”/ “Enseigner l’art à tous”, we are committed to providing people with access to the arts and solid artistic education; making people feel comfortable with the notion of artistic practice and its therapeutic benefits.

 

So, when you come to J’adart this year, you will not only be enjoying delicious appetizers from Thyme and Again Creative Catering and getting your image taken based on your heart rate by JACKPINE Creative Counsel and their super cool digital installation, you will also be supporting two very important programs! Our Community Outreach and Bursary Programs. The purchase of your ticket and all the money raised that evening goes directly towards our goal to raise $20,000 for both of these programs.

OSA Bursary Program helps to enrich the lives of many children, youth and adults each year with financial aid toward an arts education. As a past receptionist for OSA, I had the pleasure of letting families know they have received a bursary and can now afford to send their children to art class. The joy this brought them and their children is amazing. For myself, I think of the countless times my family wasn’t able to send us to art classes, a program like this definitely helps to enrich the lives of so many people who can’t afford to do so. This program has been in place for over 30 years, with students, families and adults receiving bursaries ranging from $150- $300, mostly to children and youth.

 

This program has helped many adults, including the late Tom Hogan, an aboriginal artist whose passion was painting. He had found himself homeless and wanted to take art classes. Through our bursary program, he was able to do this and in the kindest of gestures, in his Will he left a large portion of his paintings to the school. We thank him and acknowledge his kindness. Life works in full circles!

 

Our Community Outreach program is dedicated to providing free, community based visual arts classes to children and youth who face difficult economic or social circumstances and have limited access to the many benefits of a structured creative environment. These classes have no enrollment fees, no art supply fees and no transportation fees as the classes are taught in their neighborhoods at local community houses or centers. In the last 13 years OSA’s Outreach program has delivered barrier-free weekly classes and workshops to over 4000 participants, that’s around 350 per year. We are partners with 7 different community houses and centres across the city.

 

Our theme for the evening is “Dress as your favourite Artist or Artwork”, I can’t wait to see what everyone dresses up as! It should make for a colourful vibrant evening! I hope you can join us as we celebrate one of the many amazing sides of this school and all of the individuals that make it happen! See you on Wednesday!

 

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