{"id":17916,"date":"2017-07-26T15:45:28","date_gmt":"2017-07-26T19:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=17916"},"modified":"2017-07-26T15:45:28","modified_gmt":"2017-07-26T19:45:28","slug":"stories-of-aurora-and-canada-integral-to-community-mural-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/stories-of-aurora-and-canada-integral-to-community-mural-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Stories of Aurora \u2013 and Canada \u2013 integral to Community Mural project"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether it is a relaxing feeling of sitting in a Muskoka chair, beer in hand, looking over a lake at sunset, or memories of standing on the side of Yonge Street watching Terry Fox go by on his Marathon of Hope, \u201cCanada\u201d can be an evocative phrase.
\nAs it turns out, it is a perfect springboard for the community to converge and brainstorm ideas for the Canada 150 Milestone Mural which will be a lasting legacy in Aurora marking the sesquicentennial of Canadian Confederation.
\nLed by the Aurora Cultural Centre\u2019s Ted Hamer, the group has been out in the community collecting your stories and your vision for Canada and the second of two public visioning sessions will take place next Thursday, August 3, from 3 \u2013 6 p.m. at the Aurora Cultural Centre.
\n\u201cPeople have been very supportive,\u201d says Mr. Hamer of the consultations that have taken place so far, both at the Centre itself, but also out at wider community events such as the Canada Day celebrations at Lambert Willson Park and at the Aurora Farmers\u2019 Market on Saturday mornings. \u201cPeople are very excited to have something like this in Town and they have given me almost every idea possible for the Town, going from the historical persons who have lived here, to nature. Nature is a big thing here and I am very happy with that.
\n\u201cThe other thing I wasn\u2019t aware of was Aurora\u2019s commitment to volunteerism and especially the commitment to newcomers. I didn\u2019t know how many Syrian families were sponsored here initially, and that is a really neat thing to want included on the mural.\u201d
\nHamer, a Toronto-based artist with a particular penchant for creating outdoor murals is not only taking ideas from adults, but, in his role as the Centre\u2019s Community Arts Facilitator, he receives new and creative ideas from the next generation, teaching them about murals in an arts camp setting.
\nHe says he is teaching camp-goers the basics of mural art through the lens of Canada 150, and the walls in the basement Pine Tree Potters Activity Room shows just that, with hand-drawn murals featuring Canadian icons like the C.N. Tower, poutine, and just about everything in between.
\nSome of their contributions are simple concepts like animals, but some of them can be more complex, contemplating what Canada might be like decades or centuries down the road.
\n\u201cThe depth to which they go with some of their storytelling surprises me,\u201d says Mr. Hamer.
\nThe depth of the adults is providing plenty of fodder for the creative mind as well.
\nCommunity contributions to the mural project include ideas related to history and nature, but people are also coming in with poems, stories and photographs they would like to see incorporated into the finished product in some way.
\n\u201cI am getting photography from some people, which I will have to interpret as a painting because we don\u2019t have the ability to put a photograph on it,\u201d says Hamer of the mural, which will eventually be installed on outdoor panels. \u201cPeople have wanted to make it a 3D sculptural thing, and I have some ideas about that, but we\u2019re limited due to Canada and the winter. I can\u2019t stick sculpture on it because it will pop off and we have technical limits out there.\u201d
\nAt the moment, however, the use of panels is the only concrete detail \u2013 so to speak \u2013 at this point, slightly to Mr. Hamer\u2019s chagrin, as he is anxious to get the word out just where the mural will be installed and the form it will ultimately take.
\n\u201cASAP \u2013 in BIG BOLD LETTERS,\u201d he says, with emphasis, on when he would like to have these details made public. \u201cI am poking the people upstairs daily to get those gears moving,\u201d he adds with a laugh.
\nBut, in the meantime, it is all about collecting stories for that all-important finished product.
\n\u201cI would love people to come out and bring their stories \u2013 not only of Aurora, but Canada,\u201d he says. \u201cWhile Canada 150 is a national birthday, I am hoping people will focus on that through their stories, especially on Aurora. That could be someone telling me the story of watching Terry Fox run, it could be telling me the stories of the nature here, the horse trade here, of their neighbours. Somebody at the last session said their Canadian experience was sunset on a lake and two Muskoka chairs. That is what they think of when they close their eyes and think of Canada, and that is what I am hoping to get. We can get the historical figures and all those from books and everyone else, but I want the personal stories. That is what I am hoping to get.\u201d<\/p>\n

The next Community Consultation \u2013 open to all ages \u2013 will take place at the Aurora Cultural Centre on Thursday, August 3, from 3 \u2013 6 p.m. In addition to the stories, Mr. Hamer is also hoping to connect with local Aurora artists as he is eyeing opportunities for different artists from all media to contribute to the finished product.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether it is a relaxing feeling of sitting in a Muskoka chair, beer in hand, looking over a lake at sunset, or memories of standing on the side of Yonge Street watching Terry Fox go by on his Marathon of Hope, \u201cCanada\u201d can be an evocative phrase.
\nAs it turns out, it is a perfect springboard for the community to converge and brainstorm ideas for the Canada 150 Milestone Mural which will be a lasting legacy in Aurora marking the sesquicentennial of Canadian Confederation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":17892,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/2017-07-27-07.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-4EY","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-23 10:57:28","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17916\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}