ANNEX US, by LPP

On Thursday November 10^th the high school students in Valemount BC were treated to the sounds of HOJA, an a cappella group being brought into the community school through a program called ARTSMARTS.  A cultural program designed to give even the most remote school children access to arts and culture – a program that exists in every province except Alberta.  This support has resulted in McBride BC having an amazing Roundhouse Theatre in their high school, that brings in talent and artists from all over Canada.  How is this possible in a community 1/4 the size of ours? 

Is it as simple as government support for the arts?

Is it as simple as community support for the arts?

Where does support start? 

Anyone involved in the building of an arts facility or the promotion of the arts in a community will tell you it is not simple.  What you do need, however, are measurable records of support from both levels – community and government.  In Alberta the record of support for the arts ranks 12^th out of the 13 provinces and territories.  Arts and culture are not high on the agenda as evidenced by Mr Klein’s recent comments on the renovations of the Jubilee Auditoriums this year, “the support needs to come from the people – the people.” 

So how do you get support from the people? 

I would suggest we need to build this support starting with school age children.  Besides building competence socially, personally and cognitively – a solid education with an arts curriculum ingrained opens doors for opportunity, transforms learning environments, reaches students in ways that an academic curriculum alone cannot…and most importantly leads to adults who respect and frequent cultural activities and centres, building a community that truly supports arts and culture.

There is a lobbying effort in place to get an ARTSMARTS initiative into Alberta schools.  Hopefully this will build the next generation of youth looking for cultural alternatives, and lessen our need to feed the Alberta Edifice Complex.  “The Edifice Complex is high in Alberta.  Lets build a big centre and if we build it somehow the artists will come.  The real need for money is in the day-to-day running of that theatre and the day-to-day support of the artists.  Otherwise you are going to look twenty years down the line – you are going to have beautiful buildings and guest artists”, Brian Paisley, founder of the Edmonton Fringe.

Many of Alberta’s landmark facilities like the Jubilee’s and the Citadel were founded in a time when the government supported such.  Mr Klein’s government has pretty well removed those initiatives and continues to buy our allegiance with rebates and no provincial tax.  We are all paying socially (and economically but that is another story) for this naivety.

Maybe we could move the BC border over a few kilometers to get in on ARTSMARTS for our children.

back

Search