News Release                           For Immediate Release

                                                                                                                   January 5, 2012

Photovoice exhibit highlights health issues important to local youth

The Owen Sound Artists' Co-op's Legacy Project proudly presents Photovoice, a show featuring 21 photos with accompanying narratives taken and composed by local youth from Saugeen First Nation and the Chippewas of Nawash.

The collection was originally facilitated by Lindsay Wonnacott, Health Promoter at the Grey Bruce Health Unit, and featured at a Health Unit event in September, 2011. Wonnacott enlisted the guidance of Ray Auger, First Nations, Métis, Inuit Advisor for the Bluewater School Board, to work with the students. They were given digital cameras and asked to take photos over the 2010/2011 school year, and then choose from them the ones that best expressed their vision and experiences, with the ultimate goal of enhancing community health and well-being. The project grew out of the Grey Bruce Healthy Communities Partnership and Ontario’s Healthy Communities Strategy.

“Photovoice is a research technique based on the idea that local residents understand community issues better than outside professionals” said Wonnacott. The technique has been used world-wide by people of all ages as a means to communicate their experiences with decision makers. Wonnacott says photography presents a powerful medium to present what youth are seeing and experiencing in their community. “It engages and empowers youth who have first-hand knowledge of the issues that are affecting them, and it helps us to learn from their lived experiences”.

The project offers a means to gather understanding of and to engage the community in identifying priority health issues and to begin the process of local change. It was presented to the participants' community leaders with the hope of effecting change.

The show runs throughout January at The Owen Sound Artists' Co-op, 279 10th Street East, Monday to Saturday, 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. An artist meet and greet will be held on Saturday, January 7 from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. The Owen Sound Artists' Co-op's Legacy Project is funded, in part, by The Ontario Trillium Foundation.

For further information, call Public Health at 519-376-9420 or 1-800-263-3456 or visit our website at www.publichealthgreybruce.on.ca.

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For more information:

Lindsay Wonnacott

Health Promoter

Grey Bruce Health Unit

519-376-9420 or 1-800-263-3456 ext. 1529