Art
Agnes' virtual Art Hive supports positive mental health – Queen's Journal
Returning for a series of ten free online sessions, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre’s Art Hive @Agnes workshop continues to inspire wellness and self-care practices through artmaking.
Art therapist Harper Johnston will run the virtual programming on Thursday evenings from Sept. 9 to Nov. 11, carrying on the workshop program started at Agnes in January 2019.
The Journal spoke with Maddi Andrews, ArtSci ’19, an Art Hive assistant, about the Art Hive @Agnes team’s enthusiasm for using art as therapy and how they’re fostering an inclusive, judgement-free environment for participants.
“98 per cent of survey respondents indicated that Art Hive felt like a safe space for them, and I think a lot of that really comes down to the staff and the volunteers,” Andrews said, referencing a past Hive @Agnes evaluation.
“[Staff and volunteers] really contribute to the overall impression of Art Hive and how [participants] feel about the space.”
Workshops feature a diverse mix of participants—from university students of varying years and programs to families with young children, senior citizens, and immigrants. Some even tune in from different provinces and countries.
Art Hive engages a community of artists of all ages and skill levels by having participants focus on “process over product.” The relaxation produced from creating the art is more important than the appearance of the final product, Andrews said.
“[First-time participants] can expect to dive right into artmaking,” she said. “It’s completely alright if you’re not a naturally gifted artist. You don’t have to be talented or experienced to participate.”
University students can benefit from Art Hive’s approach to wellness and mental health by exploring resources beyond the traditional counsellor-client experience.
“I think that university-aged students having the autonomy to choose which type of supports are best fitted for [them] and resonate most with [them] is really incredible,” Andrews explained.
Art Hive @Agnes initially launched in January of 2019 when the team found themselves inspired by professional art therapist and associate professor at Concordia University, Janis Timm-Bottos’ conceptualization of the free and accessible form of community artmaking.
Timm-Botos’ ideas of small artmaking communities have inspired many ‘art hives’ in Montreal, and the Agnes team wanted to create a similar community experience in Kingston.
On the back of their success with the Agnes, Art Hive moved online when Ontario’s first COVID-19 lockdown in March 2020 forced most people to adopt remote forms of work and communication. People could turn to Art Hive for community and comfort every Thursday evening.
“Everyone was much more isolated than normal,” Andrews said. “There was increased stress, anxiety, uncertainty—all things that Art Hive @Agnes works to alleviate.”
Art Hive’s art as therapy approach encourages participants to practice mindfulness and self-love as they focus on the artmaking process.
“I think there’s so much room for overlap between positive mental health practices, wellness, and art,” Andrews said.
“Art as therapy really reduces stress levels, improves wellness, and reduces anxiety. It’s a process of slowing down and being in the present.”
A trio plays a cover of The Eagles hit Take it Easy as a dozen people settle in for an intimate open mic night inside Derrick McCandless and Dawn Mills’s cozy spot off highways 6 and 68 in Manitoba’s Interlake.
Strings of antique-style light bulbs cast a soft glow over the mandolin, banjo and dobro guitar that hang on a wall behind the band. An array of pottery shaped in-house by Mills dots the shelves behind the audience.
The Eriksdale Music & Custom Frame Shop is full of tchotchkes — like an Elvis Presley Boulevard street sign and vintage Orange Crush ad — that create the rustic country-living vibe the couple dreamt up before buying and transforming the vacant space over the past three years.
“I have met so many people in this community through them that I probably wouldn’t have … because of this hub,” says Mills’s cousin Dana-Jo Burdett.
Mills and McCandless are bringing people together in their rural community in more ways than one — though a return to Mills’s hometown wasn’t always in the cards.
The couple met in Winnipeg in 2011 while McCandless was playing a party at Mills’s cousin’s place. They had plans to settle in the Okanagan in McCandless’s home province of B.C. until he suffered a health scare. After that, they decided to head back to the Prairies.
WATCH | McCandless and Mills channel creative spirit into Eriksdale community:
Dawn Mills and Derrick McCandless host the RogerKimLee Music Festival in the Manitoba Interlake community of Eriksdale. They also turned a long-vacant space in town into a live music venue, instrument repair and sales store, and pottery and framing services shop.
It was the height of the pandemic in fall 2020 when the pair relocated to Eriksdale, about 130 km northwest of Winnipeg. They bought the old Big Al’s shop, once a local sharpening business that was sitting vacant.
“He was an icon in the community. He was a school teacher. He did a drama program here,” said Mills. “He brought a lot to the town.”
The building has become their own personal playground and live-in studio.
“It keeps evolving and we keep changing it and every room has to serve multi-function,” says Mills. “It’s a meeting place.”
While they love the quiet life of their community, they’re also a busy couple.
McCandless is a multi-instrumentalist with a former career in the Armed Forces that took him all over. Now, he’s a shop teacher in Ashern who sells and fixes instruments out of the music shop.
WATCH | McCandless plays an original song:
Derrick McCandless plays one of his original songs on acoustic guitar at the Eriksdale Music & Custom Frame Shop in March 2024.
Mills helped found Stoneware Gallery in 1978 — the longest running pottery collective in Canada. She offers professional framing services and sells pottery creations that she throws in-studio.
They put on open mic nights and host a summer concert series on a stage next door they built together themselves. They’re trying to start up a musicians memorial park in Eriksdale too.
One of their bigger labours of love is in honour of McCandless’s good friends Roger Leonard Young, David Kim Russell and Tony “Leon” — or Lee — Oreniuk. All died within months of each other in 2020-2021.
“That was a heart-wrenching year,” McCandless says.
They channeled their grief into something good for the community and started the RogerKimLee Music Festival.
Friends from Winnipeg and the Interlake helped them put on a weekend of “lovely music, lovely food, lovely companionship” as a sort of heart-felt send off, said Mills.
That weekend it poured rain. Festival-goers ended up in soggy dog piles on the floor of the music shop to dry out while Mills and McCandless cooked them sausages and eggs to warm up.
“It was just a great weekend,” says McCandless. “At the end of that, that Sunday, we just said that’s it, we got to do this.”
Mills says the homey community spirit on display during that inaugural year is what the couple has been trying to “encourage in people getting together” ever since.
The festival has grown to include a makers’ market, car show, kids activities, workshops, camping, beer gardens, good food and live music.
This summer, Manitoba acts The Solutions, Sweet Alibi and The JD Edwards Band are on the lineup Aug. 16-18.
Burdett has been a part of the growth, helping with branding, social media and marketing. McCandless and Mills’s habit of bringing people together has also rubbed off on Burdett.
“There’s more of my people out here than I thought, and I am very grateful for that,” says Burdett.
Their efforts to breathe new artistic life into Eriksdale caught the attention of their local MLA.
“The response from family and friend and community has been outstanding,” Derek Johnston (Interlake-Gimli) said during question period at the Manitoba Legislature in March.
“The RogerKimLee Music Festival believes music to be a powerful force for positive social change.”
Dolly Lindell, who has lived in Eriksdale for about three decades, said the couple is adding something valuable that wasn’t quite there before.
“There’s a lot of people that we didn’t even know had musical talent and aspirations and this has definitely helped bring it out,” Lindell says from the audience as McCandless, Dave Greene and Mark Chuchie wrap their rendition of Take it Easy.
McCandless, 61, said there was a time in his youth where he dreamed of a becoming a folk music star. Now his musical ambitions have changed. He’s focused on using that part of himself to bring people together.
“I think it’s that gift that I was given that that needs to be shared,” he says. “I don’t think I could live without sharing it.”
WATCH | Trio plays song at Eriksdale music shop:
Derrick McCandless, Dave Greene and Mark Chuchie play a cover of The Eagles hit Take it Easy at McCandless and Dawn Mills’s music shop in Eriksdale in March 2024.
- 1 day ago
- News
- Duration 4:42
Joel Jamensky’s sunny disposition explains why the artist with Down syndrome uses the name ‘J-positive’ for his online art business, started with the help of his parents two years ago. “There’s a lot more going on in [Joel’s] art than may be at first glance – just like him,” said his dad, Mark.
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Made Right Here: Woodworking art CTV News Kitchener
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