Around 100 people gathered at the Workstation on Monday 16th May to celebrate the opening of ‘Close to the Heart’ – an exhibition showcasing the work of 14 male students from Firth Park Community Arts College.
The work was born of a series of workshops run at the College by five local male artists.
Muazzam Khatana, aged twelve, summed up the experience for the assembled crowd, “It gave me such a lot of confidence”. (Muazzam’s artwork is pictured right.) The results were very impressive with the main feature of the exhibition a series of collages, drawings and photographs made and taken by the boys themselves. These get ‘close to the heart’ and the boys’ self-portraits against a background designed and constructed by themselves made this a very satisfying exhibition to visit.
Other sculptures and images produced by students from the College were also on display and I particularly enjoyed the series of assembled wooden cut outs making poignant statements about the concerns of young artists.
The exhibition showed what the boys can do with the support and creative mentoring that the College is actively encouraging.
For more information please contact Panni Poh Yoke Loh who curated this exhibition in her role as Community Education Co-ordinator: 257 4027.
by Tim Neal