Continuing Important Work

Neechee Studio Finds Success with Virtual Workshops

“It’s more important than ever for youth and all people to have projects to work on and feel a sense of community,” says Sarah McPherson, the assistant co-coordinator for the Neechee Studio collective. A locally founded group, Neechee Studio has been offering virtual workshops throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

McPherson has been involved with the collective since 2016, and last summer moved into the role she currently holds. As a member of the committee, McPherson handles social media, promotional work, assembling supply kits, and creating relationships within the community and with other collectives. She also initiated a website to make audience interaction more streamlined. The collective is currently supported by the Youth Opportunity Fund and other grants and local donations. An Instagram user by the name of Only Child Handicrafts recently held a local raffle and donated the proceeds to Neechee—a gesture that McPherson says “really helped us feel the love in the community.”

Although it took a while to adjust to the pandemic restrictions, by December the collective began offering online workshops. “For our first workshop we tried a Facebook Live and ever since then, we have been operating under lockdown. Right now, we work under a registration basis. This helps us keep track of kits and participants,” McPherson says. “We normally offer drop-in style, but we try to make the workshops as accessible as possible. And they usually consist of the artist and one other person running the sessions from home separately.”

She is also present during the workshops as a moderator to the audience and is there to answer any questions that arise during the teaching sessions. “The original intent of this collective was to create a safe space for Indigenous youth,” she says. “I think we need to keep in mind the other pandemic of suicide in the Indigenous youth communities and the feedback we have gotten affirms that this is important work, more than ever.”

The collective offers a variety of workshops including painting nights, beading sessions, moccasin making, medicine pouches, along with “hang out” spaces for the youth to join and spend time with the same peers they attend workshops with. The board members brainstorm ideas and then poll their Facebook audience in order to pick the next workshop. “The choosing process is very community driven,” McPherson says. Some of the workshops come with teachings shared by elders in the community. McPherson uses the medicine pouch as an example, where Elton Beardy shared his teachings on medicines and healing and Lucille Atlookan, Neechee’s founder and program coordinator, led the crafting of medicine pouches.

The Neechee Studio can be found on Facebook and Instagram @neecheestudio or at neecheestudio.com.