DRAWNTogether
Ottawa’s and Peru’s arts communities continue creative endeavors in virtual, imaginative ways Story by Stephanie Jaquins Photos provided by Arica DeArcos, NCI ARTworks and Open Space Art Gallery & Studios
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n the past, Amanda Weygand regularly hosted vendor fairs inside her downtown Ottawa art studio, Open Space Art Gallery & Studios. The public would mingle around the space booth to booth, browsing art and listening to live music. Then the pandemic flipped everything on its side. It rendered the art studio’s conventional Third Fridays impossible and forced Weygand to offer something different. “We switched to virtual Third Fridays,” Weygand says. “That was interesting, because me as a business owner had done Facebook
Lives before and knew a little about navigating social media live.” Many artists, however, had never sold their art through social media videos. Weygand created a Facebook group for the artists to join and learn about doing a Facebook Live video. “Inside the private group, we told them to go ahead and practice in here until you feel comfortable doing it. “It was really interesting trying to go from an event that was live and in person and then prep everyone and get ready for an event that was fully online,” she says.
Starved Rock Country • Spring 2021 | 21
