Pink Threads Portraits

This community arts project has so far been successful in engaging participants to come along to a workshop and produce their own art work in response to the topic of cancer.  Each workshop has been inspiring in that people have been able to put their own story down on canvas successfully, often surprising themselves as they came along with the all too common attitude of “but I can’t paint!”

The idea is that we will collect 100 canvases that tell individual stories or experiences, each joined by a “pink thread” that runs across the canvas, connecting it to the next and symbolising how we are all connected by cancer in its many forms.  The canvases will be exhibited at the Calendar Girls play by Jally Entertainment, presented locally by the Ravensthorpe Regional Arts Council on Saturday May 24.  A silent auction will be held on the night with, in the spirit of the Calendar Girls story, all funds raised going to the Leukaemia Foundation of WA.

It has been a privilege to be able to be part of this project and help people communicate their story onto canvas effectively.  Thanks to all those who have been part of it, and I can’t wait to see all of the “portraits” on display at the Calendar Girls event.

I hope you enjoy these photos by Mel Daw from workshops held in Fitzgerald, the Dunnart Gallery in Ravensthorpe and  the Chair in Hopetoun.