Pushing creativity

Pushing creativity
The Nation
Published on Jul 14, 2003

Art is used in Klong Toei to let the children there release tension and relax.

At the end of a walkway on the ground floor of the Duang Prateep Foundation (DPF) building in Klong Toei is a quiet room where slum children gather most evenings after school to draw, paint and mould with Khru Toi.

"Sawas dee khrab, Khru Toi. Sawas dee kha, Khru Toi". Children in their student uniforms one after another walk in from the hallway and greet and wai Khru Toi.

"Today we have a guest," says Toi, one of the founders of the Slum Children's Art club, briefly explaining to her students about my visit.

"Sawas dee khrab. Sawas dee kha", the children came to me and make a wai before putting their student bags on a seat.
Children who come here don't have to pay for anything, says Khru Toi, Chatchada Kruakaew, 45, who has worked with the Slum Children's Art Club from its beginning in 1982.

"We want to encourage slum children to spend their time creatively after school, expressing themselves through art and releasing the tensions some of them have as a result of their parents fighting, or a broken family. This is an alternative to writing bad words on a wall, sniffing glue and taking drugs. We want them to stay away from trouble and drugs as much as possible, at least during the moments they are with us."

Three years before the Slum Children's Art Club was officially established, Toi came to join the DPF as a volunteer teacher of slum children in Klong Toei, Bangkok's largest slum community, with approximately 80,000 residents. The inspiration drawing her to the DPF was Prateep Ungsongtham Hata, its founder.

Toi admires Prateep for her commitment to improve the lives of the slum-dwellers, a commitment that later brought her the Magsaysay and Rockefeller awards.

When Toi arrived and witnessed the harsh lives of the Klong Toei people, she realised that Prateep really needed helping hands and support. "I couldn't believe my eyes that there really was a place on earth with as many problems as the Klong Toei area", says Toi, who hasn't left the DPF ever since.

At the club pencils, crayons, coloured pencils, water colours, paintbrushes and drawing paper are laid out on a long table before the children arrive.

"I don't force them to come. These children come here with their hearts. Sometimes there are over 10 of them. Then on other days nobody comes at all. They have to help their families earn extra income by selling the lottery results or making flower garlands, says Toi, who also works as a photographer and a poster-painter at the DPF.

Children as young as three and youngsters up to 20 years old come to the club from Monday to Friday, roughly between 3.30pm and 5pm. Toi spends the morning and the early afternoon doing administrative work for the club. When the children arrive, she normally doesn't have to worry much about them.

"Children really like painting. As soon as they arrive, they immediately get started and concentrate on their work till they finish", said Canadian volunteer Graham Scott, 25, a personal banker at TD Canada Trust.

Toi doesn't teach her "students" any art theory since they already learn it in school. Instead she gives them suggestions on, for example, how to hold a paintbrush, colour choices and picture composition.

Toi often sets a picture theme for them but if the children don't want to draw on the theme or want to go home even though they haven't finished their work, it's fine with Toi.

"I don't expect them to become great artists. I just want them to do anything they feel happy about", she says.

Ten-year old Alantam Athong, a Prathom 4 student from the Choomchon Moo Ban Patana School, who comes to the club four days a week, says: "Drawing is fun and entertaining. It calms me down. My friends at school tease me and treat me badly, and I get into fights sometimes. When I come here to draw and paint, I feel better."

A recent theme Toi set is anti-narcotics, a frequent theme chosen at the club. In fact, one of the big department store chains recently contacted Toi to show her students' drawings on this theme in its stores.

"If students have skill and talent and love drawing, I'll try to support them as much as I possibly can. When I hear about an art contest or exhibition, I tell them about it. And if they want, I send their work in", says Toi.

Toi regularly sends her children's paintings to exhibitions throughout Thailand as well as in Japan and one held by the United Nations in New York every year.

Her student's work has occasionally won prizes at national and international level. One of the paintings, for instance, of a rapist and female victim crying for help, which won first prize in 1987 at a contest in Thailand, is now on show at an international children's art museum in Oslo.

"I was kind of shocked when I first saw it. The student [now at the Rajabhat Institute Suan Sunandha] who painted it said she was inspired by the rape stories she often heard in the media. It reflects a problem she sees in our society."

A painting by another club member, Kwanchai Duangdeun, 12, a Mathayom 2 student from Choomchon Moo Ban Patana School in Klong Toei was sold at the UN's art exhibition in New York. It shows an exchange of flowers between an African American and a white American.

The club relies heavily on a grant from the DPF in addition to the sale of postcards, T-shirts and paintings. Each year it needs Bt300,000 to Bt400,000, for Toi's salary and other miscellaneous expenses.

"The amount of donations made directly to the Slum Children's Art Club is very little. People think other DPF projects, such as the senior citizens' welfare fund, are better causes. Art may not be a necessary factor in life," says Toi. "But it's directly related to a good life. It benefits us psychologically and emotionally."

Volunteers are also a necessity. Toi, the only staff member, explains: "We want people to come and help. Sometimes we get volunteers from overseas who learn about the club from the DPF website. And when they visit Thailand, they drop by and offer help. We welcome Thai volunteers as well. Sometimes children who used to belong to the club when they were young come to help. But they can't make it very often. They have to make a living and take care of their families. We don't have any budget to pay them."

"Toi, do you have a rag so I can clean the table?" asked Mark Brister, 21, a self-employed decorator and British volunteer.

In the late evening at the end of a walkway on a ground floor of DPF in Klong Toei slum two volunteers were helping one another collect the art materials and clean the table where the children worked.

Volunteers and anyone interested in making a donation can contact Khru Toi at (09) 012 3681, (02) 249 2553 or (02) 249 8842. Or visit www.dpf.or.th for more information.