About 30 disabled people who like to draw, paint and do crafts will exhibit their work in CC Westrand on the occasion of 35 years of operation from Saturday, November 18 to Sunday, December 10, 2023, free to visit every day. The monitors Martine Callaert, Annie De Decker, Lise De Meulemeester, Monique Mertens and Yolande Kerkhofs; under the pedagogical and artistic leadership of painter and honorary citizen Jacky Duyck, we guide students to give them the opportunity to express themselves creatively better and to have fun doing it.
“What we do is much more than occupational therapy,” Jacky Duyck opens the conversation between the works of art in the studio. We want to give these lovely people something to do through creativity, so that they can really enjoy it. Each meeting focuses on a theme, for example circus, spring, animals, holidays, snow fun, etc. We then link material and technology to this; such as working with colored pencils, charcoal, colored markers, watercolor. We also try to arouse their interest in paintings by certain artists and movements in art history. It is also remarkable how they can express their feelings with colors. It makes you happy when you come to see the exhibition.”
“They are people who share a lot of warmth and friendship with all of us. Together with Jacky, Annie, Lise, Martine, Monique, Yolande and other monitors over the past few years, we have enjoyed many wonderful hours in the studio, but also with Jacky in his studio garden and during various excursions.”
The program is prepared annually with great enthusiasm by Jacky together with the monitors. Everyone contributes and looks for inspiration and ideas. “We also feel a lot of appreciation and friendship from the parents and family, the educators and supervisors, and in particular from the chairman Polly Spiliers and the board of the association VOS Pajottenland vzw – “STAN” Meeting point for intellectual disabilities. “
Artist Jacky Duyck speaks with great pride about his students, he has been the “inspirer” and supervisor in this studio for 35 years. “Our artists come from their daily activities, from supervised work or from their work in a tailor-made company, but they are faithfully present at every lesson evening! (twice a month on Monday evening). During each lesson they are very intensely committed to their drawing or painting, and they are not lacking in inspiration!”
“It is important in Dilbeek and in CC Westrand that disabled people are given these opportunities and feel happy in the inspiring and friendly atmosphere of our studio. During the preparation of the exhibition, the monitors are always pleasantly surprised at the selection of the works, a treasure of beauty and poetry made by real ‘color artists’. The variety of these exhibited works of art make this exhibition very beautiful for all visitors, and certainly not to be missed. Over the past 35 years, each exhibition has attracted enormous interest,” says Jacky Duyck.
in collaboration with the association “STAN”, Trefpunt intellectual disability and with the support of Rotary Gaasbeek-Pajottenland.
