paint your faith

One of the key partners in the Paint Your Faith project is the First United Mission in the downtown east side of Vancouver. They do some phenomenal work in the DTES as a church that from its early days served as a mission. They’re open 24-7, 365 days of the year. They are so focussed on serving the needs of their community that the main chapel doesn’t hold any pews. Instead of wooden pews there are rows upon rows of bunk beds for homeless people to sleep in. I went in at about 2pm for a location scout and half the beds were full with people slumbering, or dazed and resting. First United not only gives people a place to sleep, they provide 3 hot meals plus a night time snack, and they provide essentials like condoms, footcare, ‘girlie things’, and squares of soap which have been painstakingly hand cut from a regular sized soap bars. On an average day they have 500 people coming through their doors. It’s awe-inspiring. In an age when people talk of empty churches, this is one church that is in constant demand.

Titi's first crack and suggestion for our wall

Its been an interesting experience working on producing a wall of this size and event with artists who are in different parts of the world. In Toronto we had Chor Boogie and Siloette flown in, Elicser and Mediah were local and when they came together they just hit the wall and it was quite spontaneous, intense but truly original the form of street art. This time around in Vancouver our approach was quite different. The City of Vancouver has a tight program on street art and we had to apply for a permit, this required the submission of what the actual art work would look like on the wall we plan to create the art on. This meant reaching out to Faith47 in South Africa, Titi Freak in Sao Paulo and Indigo and Peeta in Vancouver and somehow coming together to plan how they would hit the wall together ahead of doing the work on-site and spontaneously. As a producer, we are use to the many moving parts involved with creating projects the size of Toronto and Vancouver, there are so many variables and anything could go wrong, but we managed to bring an amazing crew of talent, work with so many great partners and supporters and we are all pretty excited about how the wall will look at 55-57 W.Hastings St. For anyone who plans to work in Vancouver, be prepared that the process is quite deep and there are many many details you need to cover. These types of projects are great for the city, community and especially the local people who will see the art everyday. I hope to share more of my experience and happily give anyone advice on doing this in your city or local community.

Titi started to give it some life and colour

Alan Serpa is producer for Paint Your Faith Vancouver and Toronto.