Art for AIDS International (artforaidsinternational.org)

Lower Level: 242 Dundas Street

(519) 282-5911

By Tess Meehan

In early October, my classmates and I participated in a workshop at the Art for AIDS International Gallery with renowned Canadian artist Hendrikus Bervoets. It was held in the gallery’s basement studio, where the walls are already lined with beautiful collages created by students from all over the world.

We began by flipping through National Geographic magazines and tearing out inspirational pictures. When we had roughly 20 pages each, we separated them into two piles – the background and the “storytellers.” My storytellers were eye-catching pictures of people and animals, and my backgrounds were brilliant landscape and outer space photos. The most difficult part of the workshop came next, when we had to master the art of the X-Acto knife; it is much harder than it seems. With the knives, we painstakingly cut out the important parts of our storytellers and discarded the rest. We arranged our carefully selected storytelling pieces on abstract back grounds created by tearing pieces from two of our magazine back grounds and pasting them together on a piece of card. The finished products were incredible! It was truly amazing to see the artwork that my classmates had created and the inspiring messages that had been thoughtfully portrayed in each piece. Our collages looked professional and definitely worthy of purchase by discerning collectors. Overall, this experience has shown me that it is not at all difficult to make a difference, it’s actually quite fun.

Tess Meehan is a student at Westminster Secondary School.

Editor’s note: Following each workshop, selected student-produced collages are made into limited edition prints. Monies raised through the sale of these prints benefit HIV/AIDS affected women and children in sub-Saharan Africa

[Photos: Top: Westminster Secondary School student Renyas Nimet's art piece which will be featured at the Art for AIDS exhibit at the Apharteid Museum in South Africa this November; Right: Writer Tess Meehan and her art piece; Lower Left: Group shot]