WEAVE See Beyond Gallery Exhibition at Business Objects
For Media

About the DEWC
The Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre (DEWC) provides for basic needs of women living in the Downtown Eastside, and works toward positive change for women and children in the community.
The constitution of the DEWC was written in 1978 upon incorporation and is still relevant today.
• To provide a comfortable, safe drop-in centre
• To provide recreation and self-help programs
• To act as a source of information by assisting women with referrals concerning their needs
• To provide a social space and facilitate the opportunity for women of diverse backgrounds to interact and build community
• To educate the public and all levels of government about issues concerning women in the area

About WEAVE
Women Engaged in the Arts Vision & Empowerment (WEAVE) is a program that creates opportunities for self expression for the women of the Downtown Eastside.
The WEAVE program offers:
• Weekly art workshops at the DEWC and various community locations - an opportunity for women to experiment with different art mediums including painting, print making, drawing and sculpture
• Group art projects - in addition to teaching art techniques, the goal is to build a community mindset through the group creation of one art piece. Group projects occur on a monthly basis.
• Visiting artist lectures – feature artists provide candid discussions about their work, their process, and their lives
• Field trips – to provide inspiration and learning opportunities through a visit to nature or other artists’ workshops
• Art Cart – extends access to art through a mobile art studio which visits different women's organizations around the Downtown Eastside
• Gallery exhibitions – work with the local community to promote and display art developed from WEAVE
WEAVE's goals and philosophy:
• Opportunities for positive reinforcement and healthy expression through creation of art
• Collaboration and community - bringing divergent communities and people together to provide a greater voice for the women of the Downtown Eastside
• Development of economic opportunities by building a sustainable and supplementary source of income for women
WEAVE origins:
• DEWC mandate is on basic services (food, shelter, safety, hygiene), but the administrator and board recognized the need to help women think beyond their present circumstances and develop more positive futures
• Rose Saphan, a Coast-Salish artist, recognized the need for aboriginal women (of whom there is a significant population in the Downtown Eastside) to find their voices. She applied for funding from the Canada Council for the Arts and the BC Council for the Arts for WEAVE, a program to encourage arts development.
• The funding was granted—and WEAVE needed a home. The DEWC agreed to host WEAVE art workshops and meals as part of its regular schedule of programs for women of the Downtown Eastside.
Women’s humanity resuscitated in workshops
• Communications skills developed: On Saturdays, a core group of non-English speaking grandmothers come to the sewing group. They communicate via demonstration to others, who pay careful attention.

• Social skills developed: Women must share limited resources and work together. Once, during a workshop with clay, someone got angry and smashed the clay around; that same woman later offered an apology—something that might not happen on the street.

• Sense of pride restored: Women who have lost themselves through addiction, violence, or poverty, can start to find pride in starting and finishing projects, and in seeing their work displayed in public galleries.
 
Downtown Eastside Women’s issues revealed in art and workshops
• Need for stability: Women depend on the schedule of art workshops to regulate otherwise chaotic lives

• Need for refuge: Addicts, who are high, sit at the art tables and focus on the art project at hand; they are known to comment to the instructors “I really needed that time.”

• Need for expression: Women depict hopeful elements in their art; some are satirical and subversive—one woman, April, prefers political cartoons as a mode of expression
WEAVE sponsors:
• DEWC
• Gallery Gachet
• British Columbia Arts Council
• Canada Council for the Arts
• Business Objects

Business Objects’ commitment to the DEWC
Business Objects has a history of involvement with the DEWC, from hosting and funding annual summer barbecues, to sending volunteers to help prepare gifts and meals at Christmastime.

The opportunity to become involved in the WEAVE project was embraced by employees who were excited to contribute to a program that would benefit women of the Downtown Eastside and bring awareness of their social issues to the rest of Vancouver.
Key activities/highlights
• Committee of 10 Business Objects women focused on helping WEAVE generate awareness by organizing an art show and other collaborative activities/projects to help bridge Yaletown and Eastside communities
• Business Objects Community provided $6,800 in funding for art supplies and the art show
• Business Objects volunteers have created a website www.weavearts.org
• Business Objects employees have attended and volunteered at WEAVE workshops at DEWC
• Business Objects is inviting participants from Downtown Eastside to create art at our facility. Employees will collaborate with women from the Downtown Eastside to make prints.
• Business Objects is hosting an art/community night on February 22, 2007 (See Beyond) to help build awareness and fundraise for WEAVE
About See Beyond
See Beyond is a gallery exhibition of WEAVE artists hosted by Business Objects on February 22, 2007 (5-8 p.m.). It is the culmination of a partnership between Business Objects and WEAVE to:
• Bridge communities that border one another, but are separated by vast distances in our imaginations (Yaletown/Downtown Eastside)
• Celebrate the accomplishments of women who have created art as part of WEAVE program
• Build awareness of issues affecting women of Downtown Eastside
The name “See Beyond” was chosen to invite:
• People from outside the Downtown Eastside to consider issues of poverty, violence, and addiction from a female perspective. For example, homelessness for women does not involve repose on the street or in a makeshift camp: sleep in public will often result in a rape or beating. Women are therefore not visible as part of the homeless street population; to “See Beyond” in this instance is to understand that the issue of homelessness affects men and women differently.
• Everyone to explore the possibility of hope that the WEAVE art workshops offers women in intractably difficult situations
For photos, bios or more information, contact

Susan Kirk
James Hoggan & Associates
604 315 9959
skirk@hoggan.com

or

Angela Salehi
James Hoggan & Associates
604 739 7500
asalehi@hoggan.com