Canada has welcomed more than 35,000 Syrians since last year, in stark contrast to other countries that are sealing their borders in response to the refugee crisis. To help them integrate, the country is turning to art—a critical part of Syria’s history and culture.
Canada is using art to build bridges with Syrian refugees, while the rest of the world builds walls to keep them out
WRITTEN BY Payal Uttam in REFUGE IN ART for QUARTZ. Posted December 4, 2017
Toronto’s Aga Khan Museum, an institution that promotes Islamic heritage, recently invited a group of Syrian refugees to view a new exhibition tracing more than 5,000 years of art from their homeland. Called “Syria: A Living History,” the show is the first major art exhibition in the West on the region since the war erupted in 2011. While museums can take as long as two to three years to plan a show, Aga Khan Museum CEO and director Henry Kim says the project was fast-tracked, with 48 works gathered from seven international museums in 9 months. “We decided to do it under fairly short notice, because the story had to be told now. It couldn’t wait,” says Kim.
Aga Khan Museum’s show is one of many initiatives across Canada using art to communicate with Syrians and help them ease into life in a new country. The governmental Canada Council for the Arts, for example, has dedicated CAD $300,000 ($226,000), with the support of a private sponsor, to providing Syrian refugees with free access to more than 60 art spaces, theater and music performances.
“Most of the arts organizations are doing more than just offering tickets to see a show. Many are hosting special meetings, meals or discussions before and after shows for the Syrian community,” says Simon Brault, the Council’s director and CEO. “There are many needs to address when a country is accepting refugees: food, housing and social security, those come first, but to feel included, they also need to understand the culture of that new society.”
The Council’s pilot initiative is part of wider government and civic plans to welcome Syrian refugees. In addition to providing English classes for adults, the nonprofit CultureLink, a settlement agency that is financially supported by the government, has invited Syrian children aged 6 to 12 to form The Nai Children’s Choir. With the help of volunteer musicians, the children are taught to sing in Arabic, English, and French, and have been staging performances across Toronto since April. Through music, the youth are gaining confidence to deal with linguistic and social challenges.
“Welcoming people is a series of gestures that can take many forms,” says Charlie Foran, CEO of the nonprofit Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC), which organized the visit to Aga Khan Museum and has been taking Syrian refugees to museums across the country since April. “Art takes away the idea of otherness, of people being strangers…it’s fundamentally about how humans are connected.”
Read the complete story at the source Quartz | REFUGE IN ART | Canada is using art to build bridges with Syrian refugees, while the rest of the world builds walls to keep them out
Research, Insight & Perspective by A. Maherali
Ismailimail 
Must be a very moving experience to view their former country’s art here in Canada. I’m hoping to visit the museum next year.
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