Arts-based, cross-community support in Belfast
Belfast, United Kingdom
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Aim
Help people targeted & affected by racist violence in Belfast to access psychosocial support in online, arts-based cross-community sessions
Over the past few days, we’ve watched events unfold across Belfast that have left many of us, especially our children and young people, feeling frightened, confused, and unsafe. With public transport disrupted, schools closing early, and racial violence causing deep fear and anxiety on our streets, our young people are being exposed to things no child should have to face. Valuable members of our society working across sectors - academia, healthcare, business, education, food and hospitality, the arts etc - have had their lives disrupted - with many afraid to leave their homes, while afraid of being targeted - in their homes.
Since 2022, eduSOIL hans been delivering the Art For Change programme - a cross community space for young people to take action on issues affecting them through chosen art medium. While our programme had been repeatedly disrupted by racist pogroms that deeply affected our participants, it has also enabled them to name their difficult emotions- and turn it into powerful art that has moved hundreds of people in Belfast. The most common issues affecting them....
We have opened up online cross-community support sessions for children and teenagers to share their feelings and concerns about recent events, and heal. Each session guides participants to navigate the exposure to racial violence through arts-based strategies and to connect with others. We have had volunteers joining in from South Africa, India and Canada - and volunteers supporting from across NI and England to enable these sessions. Since launching on June 10, we have had children and adults join in and name the difficult emotions they have been feeling and then engage arts-based strategies to help process these emotions. We have felt anxious together - and we have felt hope together. This matters.
Help eduSOIL continue to deliver these sessions. We are 'ethnic minority' founded and fuelled; 100% volunteer led - with zero core funding. Since 2011 eduSOIL has empowered 16,000 primarily black and brown underserved youth in 13 countries through culturally responsive and trauma-informed wellbeing programmes. We had planned an Art For Change programme with a small project grant from Arts Council Northern Ireland and in-kind support from Queen's University Belfast (QUB) and had a series of events scheduled to take place at QUB on June 13th, 27th and July 6 - 10th, alongside 10 on-site sessions at schools and community centres over June. We have a Crowdfunder campaign to raise much needed funds for programme management as well as and travel and refreshments and we are now unsure of how we will be able to continue deliver the planned programme. And we have a pressing need - to help people targeted by racist violence in Belfast to access psychosocial support in online, arts-based cross-community sessions.
Your funds will help:
- employ coordinators to manage participant registrations and the team of volunteers attending to technical requirements, workshop preparation, social media
- pay artists and facilitators who are all immigrants and people who are ethnic minorities in Northern Ireland who work freelance and are not on salaried who will deliver daily sessions as follows:
💻 Session A | 18:00 - 19:00
- For younger children and teenagers under 16
- Gentle creative activities, reassurance, and a calm environment
💻 Session B | 19:30 - 20:30
- For 16 years old and up
- Processing deeper anxieties, navigating scary social media content, and finding hope.
- plan and deliver an onsite programme bringing participants together at QUB to co-create a piece of art together - be it a song, drama piece, poetry, dance - or a combination of it all.
- plan and deliver a public showcase later this year, like we have done in previous years at the Oh Yeah Music Centre in 2023, at the Harty Room (QUB) in 2024 and at the Brian Friel Theatre 2025.
Why? For people, especially young people feeling scared or angry or just exhausted right now, we need to be re-assured that our feelings matter. We need spaces to come together both online and in-person to express truths, pain and power - and be heard and seen. We need to come together with people from diverse backgrounds who know that most people in Northern Ireland - an across this island we call home - are not racist. We need to continue to demonstrate solidarity, harmony and unity in diversity - and by co-creating art pieces that we will showcase to once again respond to racist violence with truth and power, with clarity and talent and with the aim of bringing people together - to empower young people to realise their innate goodness and to celebrate the positive impact they make on the world.
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 4th September 2026 at 12:41am