A recent spray paint project at the skate park inspired Stoney youth to show their support for the Lesbian, Gay, Bi-Sexual, Trans, or Questioning (LGBTQ) community, in light of a massacre in the United States.
On June 12 in the early morning hours, a gunman opened fire in a LGBT club in Orlando, Florida, murdering 49 people and wounding 53 others before police killed Omar Mateen in a shootout.
The shooting spree was America’s deadliest mass killing by a single shooter.
Support across North America, including Alberta, poured in over the weekend as Americans and Canadians held vigils and hung rainbow flags to promote awareness and show solidarity.
And now Cochrane has a permanent piece of art to show LGBTQ support.
“The art has evolved with the LGBTQ community on our mind these days, and it pulls together a lot of things,” said Gayle Davis, Morley Community School teacher.
An all-girl group of Stoney students came together last Thursday and painted two murals at the Zero Gravity skate park in Cochrane, including one with a dream catcher surrounded by rainbow colours, which over the years has become a symbol for the LGBTQ community.
“It is about keeping your dream alive, the colours represent the people and diversity, and the feather is to remind us that we can all fly,” Davis said.
The Stoney youth were invited as part of a bigger project, to help beautify the skate park while also addressing the illegal tagging issue, as previously explained by Jola Muran, event organizer with the Town of Cochrane.
“It was great day,” Muran said.
Approximately 32 artists decorated the bowl with mixed mediums paints and spray-paint.
“We’ve been invited out to be a part of this because the skate park is used by so many Stoney youth and we really appreciate being included in this event,” Davis said.
When the original mural did not work out after a series of new sketches and painting over, the youth were happy with the final product.
“These art pieces were different when we left Morley and things just came to mind today,” Davis explained.
“We have one Yamnuska-style painting with medicine colours as the sunset, that was planned and laid out, while our other piece today has been a series of frustrations but the kids have stayed strong and we worked on pulling a dream catcher today.”
The art piece, among several others that now colour the concrete, can be viewed at the Zero Gravity Skate Park, located at the intersection of Westrock Road and Highway 22.
