Last month the SSH reported on Weave Youth Family Community’s award-winning building (the $2.7 million starburst building at the corner of Elizabeth and Allen streets in Waterloo won the Sulman Award for Public Architecture) and inspirational programs. Weave client Kat Hines spoke of the organisation’s generous and genuine staff, and about her passion for art. In August Ms Hines won a graphic design competition. Her original artwork now features on posters and promotions for the Mad Pride youth event to be held at 107 Redfern Street, Redfern, on Wednesday October 9.
Ms Hines was “thrilled and honoured” to win the competition that was open to all participants in the Weave Arts Program as well as contacts of teacher-therapist Grace Naidu. The Weave Arts Program works in partnership with local community services, Mental Health Services, Department of Juvenile Justice, and Missenden and Concord Psychiatric Hospitals, visiting an average of 8-12 people per hospital per week.
Ms Hines said: “Janelle [Ghazi] is team leader of Speak Out [a dual diagnosis program that works with young people aged 12-28 years who experience coexisting mental health and drug and alcohol issues]. Janelle and the team were brainstorming ideas for Mad Pride – this year’s theme is kindness.
“I had the idea [for the artwork] on the spot. Kindness was the key word. I was working with a principle, ‘mind your kind’, which suggests caring for others – the rose is a symbol of kindness – as well as everything to do with minds or brains. The different colours represent different areas of the brain, and contemporary research into brain activity and function. The brain freaks me out, it’s so complicated.”
Ms Hines enjoys working with soft pastels on paper. “I like the bright colours, blending, layering, getting my hands dirty,” she said. “The work changes as you go; it’s a bit like painting. I started with the light colours, then built up the image from there, adding the highlights to finish.”
The 2013 Sydney Mad Pride youth event will be held in the creative hub of Redfern, 107 Projects. It will be an evening of live performances, live music, film, visual arts, expo and young talent, showcasing the creative achievements of young people while breaking down the stigma associated with mental health experiences.
The event was last held in 2011. Weave counsellor Bahadur Bryson is looking forward to Mad Pride’s return. “There are opportunities for live bands, dancers, filmmakers and poet-performers,” she said. “Performers will be paid, too.”
Janelle Ghazi said: “Mad Pride provides young people with an opportunity to celebrate other parts of their identity, to show that there is more to them than their mental health diagnosis. It offers the public an opportunity for insight into the personal stories of young people experiencing mental health issues while celebrating their resilience and creative achievements. An event like Mad Pride is needed as it counteracts discrimination and prejudice often shown towards young people experiencing mental health issues.”
Kat Hines, with faithful canine companion Indy for support and inspiration, is working on some new artworks for exhibition at Mad Pride. “They’re pastels,” she said. “One I started yesterday is about respect. It features a punk saluting the Australian landscape.”
