The RAWQ Report

Article by Shaun Peppy

Mr. Peppy is a local musician and Secretary of the Board of Directors of RAWQ or West Quebecers.

Culture is an inescapable force, it's in the design of your clothes, the way you talk, the music you listen to and the town where you live. It's easy to take culture, in the broadest sense, for granted. When we pause to examine what our local culture means to our individual and collective identities and ways of life, it is easy to see why we should involve ourselves more in it.

Everyone has a song with great sentimental value, a favourite painting in their house or a book that changed their lives. Often when we consume these cultural products we forget that a person who was strongly influenced by their local culture created these masterpieces. Unfortunately, Quebec, like most of North America, is driven by the star system and many people only come to know artists who are disseminated through the mass media. The province of Quebec and the Outaouais have an incredible number of superb artists, performers and entertainers, many of whom are not well known. As excellent as they are, Celine Dion and Cirque Du Soleil are not typical representations of Quebec art and culture. That being said, there was a time when the two were known only locally. There are many small venues and events in our area, such as the Black Sheep and The Pontiac Artists Tour, that regularly present excellent talent and inspiring works with a local flavour.

Besides public support, there are many other ways the arts community can be assisted. Recently, the Arts and Culture task force of the Quebec Community Groups Network's Global Development plan identified some key challenges for the arts community of Quebec. The arts community can always do more to demystify what it does, to make it more "user friendly". Sometimes a lack of understanding intimidates people from enjoying displays of art of all kinds. Opening up more public spaces as arts venues will help as well. Strong community support is also needed for more and better quality arts programs in schools. There is ample evidence that support the value of arts programs for not just creating future artists, but for improving the critical, creative and mathematical thinking skills as well as spatial and conditional reasoning skills.

Art and its representation in our local culture is not a luxury or a matter of leisure, it has everything to do with who we were, are and are going to be.

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