We established a new comic art festival in Huntington Beach last weekend and wanted to create an accessible, fun, high quality element aimed at encouraging young people to be creative and develop a interest in and passion for drawing and cartooning. We partnered with the Chuck Jones Center for Creativity having never worked with them before. The whole experience of working with them, both in the organising phase and at the weekend itself, was one of the best I have ever experienced in terms of partnerships. They created a wholly accessible and innovative zone where kids and their families could come and play and create art giving them confidence and creating a thirst for more. I spoke to some of those who took part and they loved it. The Center was generous and enthusiastic and just wish I could bring them to the UK where I also run a festival. The future of our artform , if not civilisation !, is education and I applaud the Center for all it is doing and hope we can work together again in the future.
Julie Tait, Co-Director NCSFest (www.ncsfest.com)
As a Geriatric Case Manager who has had a long history of working with individuals with dementia and Alzheimer's since the 1970s, I cannot overemphasize the importance of seniors actively working on activities that will prevent (or even reverse) cognitive decline. The classes that Denise Dion-Scoyni and her staff members held on May 17th at Hoag and the Thursday classes at Oasis Senior Center in June were exceptional! She had a great balance & variety of individual and group activities that inspired creative expression, team working, strategization of solutions ("Wylie Coyote" food seeking venture), memory retention and recall, prefrontal executive functions, visual stimulation, and social interaction. This type of activity can certainly play an instrumental role in preventing and reversing the cycle of cognitive decline -especially when the individual combines this type of ongoing activity with healthy nutrition, physical exercise, and positive attitude & working with decreasing or minimizing or eliminating anxiety and stress from one's life. Even though, I realized that Denise had recently gone through a loss, she stayed focused and continued to empower each individual in the class and put her "heart and soul" into the activities!
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
Gail Kawanami
E-mail: seniortransitions.lifeworks@gmail.com
PH: (714) 654-6636