Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Youth use art to address climate change


BAGUIO CITY - “Pinili tayong mga kabataan ngayon para makinig dahil naniniwala sila na mahuhubog pa nila ang mura nating isipan para sa pakikiisa sa nais nilang gawin. Pero paano nga tayo makikiisa kung mura pa ang ating isipan? At ito ang sagot sa tanong na iyan. Kung ang maliliit na basura ay nagsamasama at nakayanang magpatumba ng ating bayan, tayo pa kaya na kahit mumunti ang isang bayan, basta’t nagsasama-sama at nagkakaisa ay kayang matapos ang ating problema.”(Today’s youth are chosen to listen, because people realize that we’re young and vulnerable, and are bound to be unquestioning. But how are we going to act upon if we can sometimes be naïve? Here’s the answer to that; if we come together as one, unite for the greater purpose, then we can end our problems.)

So goes an excerpt from a prose piece by one of the students of Baguio City National High School (BCNHS) Special Program for the Arts (SPA) who participated during the Arts for Nature Fest, a forum on climate change adaptation and nation building at the Baguio City National High School on July 31.

Around two dozen artworks and literary pieces were created at the said event, all heeding the advice of the forum’s resource speaker, Baguio media veteran Ramon Dacawi, to bring down the meaning of climate change that can be understood by young children.

From poems and essays written in English and Filipino, the students expressed different points of view with the universal message of using human activity to mitigate something that came to be because of human activity: climate change. Some wrote from the point of view of an observer, one wrote as a flower saying “Please don’t let me die”, one wrote a letter from Climate Change itself, one wrote about a girl named Laura whose mantra is “Earth is my home, I will protect it”, and most rallied for change through their writing.

Visual artists from the SPA expressed similar messages in their artworks using crayons or oil pastel as their medium.

BCNHS Principal Dr. Elma Donaal, in her message, said the forum was one which the school could not say “no” to because it was timely. She added the youth has an important role in the protection of Mother Earth and the Special Arts Program is chosen for the program so their voices through arts can also be heard.

Also present in the forum to motivate the youth with a talk on nation building was Invictus Buenaventura of Pilipinas Natin. Buenaventura, after seeing the works of the SPA students, said there is hope for Baguio because of the talent of the students from the SPA which could help in the protection of the environment. (JDP/Pryce E. Quintos, PIA-CAR)


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