Arts for All weaves community together at Supercrawl 2024

Arts for All presents "fabric > fabric," an interactive exhibit that invited Supercrawl attendees to celebrate the joy of creating together

Arts for All, formerly Culture for Kids in the Arts, is a charitable organization run by the Hamilton Conservatory of Arts that provides access to arts education programming to children and youth throughout Hamilton and surrounding areas.

One of Arts for All's initiatives is Artasia, a summer program which mentors and equips young adults to deliver a five-week arts program to children in their neighbourhoods. Selections from this year’s program, “fabric > fabric,” were displayed at Supercrawl alongside an interactive tapestry exhibit.

This past summer, Artasia brought arts education to over two thousand children in 44 neighbourhoods including Waterdown, Crown Point and Binbrook. Participants explored the meaning that can be both found and created in fabric and fabric-based art practices such as drawing with fabric markers, gluing fabric scraps and tie-dying. The “fabric > fabric” program considered and included themes related to community, cultural identity and sustainability.

Artasia facilitator Setareh Masoumbeiki discussed the inspiration for this year’s program in an interview with the Silhouette. “What I really enjoy about Artasia, and what Artasia is to me, is that it always starts with a question. And this year we started with a question of when is fabric more than fabric? How can we look at fabric with different eyes, with new ways of looking?” said Masoumbeiki.

At the conclusion of each summer, Arts for All puts together an artwork that incorporates the children’s artwork from Artasia. This year, the “fabric > fabric” exhibit at Supercrawl featured two quilts made up of tie-dyed and flower-pounded fabric created during the program.

The quilts were hung up on a rope between two trees and incorporated over 400 individual squares of fabric. Masoumbeiki described the impact the scale of the exhibit had on her. "You come and you look at them and it’s just breathtaking. All of [the kids], all these neighbourhoods, all these organizations," said Masoumbeiki.

Masoumbeiki described the quilts as a testament to the children’s abilities. “It’s a quilt but it’s also a banner. It’s a statement of the children’s voices, what children can do and how capable they are in creating art and being creative,” said Masoumbeiki.

In addition to displaying work from the summer program, the “fabric > fabric” exhibit also featured an interactive community tapestry. Nine looms were constructed with metal frames and orange fencing. Supercrawl attendees were invited to participate in the exhibit by writing ideas and stories on strips of fabric and weaving them into the looms. Participants also knotted and braided the pieces of fabric.

Masoumbeiki said that the exhibit was designed with kids in mind. The looms were low enough to the ground that young children could participate in the tapestry.

To create fabric strips for the community tapestry, the Artasia team repurposed and naturally dyed donated bed sheets. Masoumbeiki stated that she hoped the exhibit would prompt people to think about sustainability, something that is central to Artasia’s practices. She said that she hopes people will start to understand that “things can be one thing, and then you can use them to create so many other things.”

"We always want to have something to be interactive, because that interactive part of it, that community art is always part of what we believe in," said Masoumbeiki. She also noted that the looms will be donated to the community organizations that supported Artasia 2024.

If you are interested in learning more about Arts for All and the programs they provide, check out their website, Instagram and Facebook.