Art is an important part of healthy human development as it provides the opportunity for free expression and creativity. In order to allow such opportunities for freedom and creativity to occur an “Art Venture” program was implemented in July 2009 in all GHRE/FED run primary schools; prior to this program starting few migrant students had ever seen Burmese fine art before. To increase the student’s knowledge of Burmese fine arts the “Art Venture” program is divided into four sections.

1) Painting

2) Art

3) Music

4) Drama

The objective of this program as stated by Ko Myat Thu who is in charge of “Art Venture” is to increase the children’s knowledge of and skills in Burmese and Thai fine arts. This will allow them to develop their own skills and personalities and also to pass their knowledge and skills on to other children thus benefiting the community as a whole. Almost all migrant children born in Thailand have very few educational opportunities as their parents are forced to move often and do not have enough money to provide basic educational needs therefore the GHRE/FED run schools and programs such as “Art Venture” make a huge impact on many children’s lives.

The “Art Venture” program has allowed many children to have their eyes opened to the importance of art. Many children who have rarely experienced art or music before have thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to and now almost all of the children are now interested in traditional Burmese musical instruments.  Tun Nay Aung an “Art Venture” student expressed these feelings saying “I have just seen the Burmese orchestra in Helvetian, I’m never seen be go any other place. Now I see and I want to try for myself, I’m so surprised and I think it’s wonderful.” Another student named Htun Nay Aung explained the musical instruments; “‘The Drum’ is made by wooden body and leather surface, the ‘cymbals’ are made of brass and there are also ‘bamboo clappers’ when we all play together wonderful sounds appear and we are all very excited.” International volunteers are responsible for  teaching many of the ‘fine arts’ programs in GHRE/FED run summer camps.

11 “Art Venture” students from GHRE/FED run schools had their paintings submitted to the “Orient Global Freedom to Create Prize” for 2009.  The Freedom to Create Prize aims to foster “a voice for the frightened, silent majority” through the creative freedom of art.  There are three main prizes available; the main prize, imprisoned artist prize and the youth prize with a combined value of US$125 000, the winner is to be announced on the 25^th of November 2009.

These are three of the GHRE/FED entrants into this year’s competition. The first entrant is fourteen year old Soe Zaw Zaw who entered a painting titled “Justice and Freedom” He says that “in the picture you can see one lady and a bird in a cage. They lady is mean Aung San Suu Kyi, she is well known across the world for her non violent struggle for democracy and human rights. She is also the democratically elected leader of Burma and she wants freedom for her people. The lady is still under arrest and has just faced another court case against her. The bird represents peace and freedom. One day the sky. I’m very sad that innocent Nobel prize winner is still under arrest by the Burma Government”.

The second entrant is a girl named Ma Ni Ni Win and the title of her painting is  “The life of Inlay.” With her painting she aims to show the audience about the life style of the Inlay ethnic group in Burma. “I want people to know about this ethnic group in Burma who live on man island in a lake surround by mountains I want the viewer to see what their livelihood is and know more about where they are, their geography and scenery that surrounds them,” she said.

The final entrant is a 12 year old boy named kyaw Moe Lwin his painting is entitled “Green Land” he hopes his painting encourages people to “take care of the environment so it can be always green. We must respect nature and their land because it is beautiful. I’m darning this picture because I want to be green and full of plenty of nature. Now the world is going hotter and more day. If the nature is destroyed the weather is also going to change and get worse and the earth is going to terrible. I hope this picture is inspires the people to respect nature more.”

The children’s instructor explained that all of the children can draw with minimal help and almost all of the children were interested in drawing pictures of Aung San Suu Kyi and traditional Burmese families. She expressed that all the pictures were wonderful but she did not hold out any great hope of winning the “Orient Global Freedom to Create Prize.” Art however is very important for all children to express freely what they are thinking and feeling and this is why GHRE/FED is placing a great emphasis on the development of art skills for Burmese migrant children.