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)
