Youth checked out art and took part in workshops at Hintonburg’s Awesome Indies Urban Arts Festival (Photo: Ashley Metzger)
The Awesome Indies Urban Arts Festival for Youth had a Hintonburg neighbourhood literally dancing in the streets this past weekend as b-boys and b-girls along with local artists took turns entertaining the community in an attempt to bring its diverse residents together.
“It’s been an amazing experience,” said Jolynn Sommervill, who helped organize the weekend. “It’s been a very easy festival to put together because people have been very receptive to it, particularly in this community, and it’s right because it sort of merges artists and kids in a really good way.”
The Patrick John Mills Gallery and the Hintonburg Community Centre hosted the three-day festival from Oct. 2-4 that featured face-painting, laser graffiti, a street musical march and a Michael Jackson “Thriller” dance workshop to go along with the b-boys and b-girls performance.
“I think they’ve kind of covered a lot of things,” said Julia Gutsik, a.k.a. b-girl JusSik, after her group’s dance performance on Hinchey Avenue before a boisterous crowd in the drizzling rain opening night.
“I think they’ve touched on a lot of the elements of hip hop as well. They’re showing contemporary art and they’re having a graffiti display and DJing and a scratching workshop and all those kinds of things, so that’s a lot of the things that I’d like to see,” Gutsik said.
Monique Kok, who attended opening night at Awesome Indies along with her 14-year-old daughter Zoe, said the opportunity to visit the Mills Gallery was enough of a reason for her to head over to the festivities, but that the broader appeal of bringing the communities youth together to experience art was the best reward.
“What is the point of having a festival like this?” Monique asked. “It’s trying to encourage art among youth and trying to get them to express themselves in this way.”
Zoe agreed while admiring an Orion Nebula-painted abstract vase that when looked into seemed to show the universe.
“I’ve always had a love for sculpting,” said Zoe. “This is a way to access my love for sculptures.”