To celebrate Refugee Awareness Day we are holding a Refugee Art Show and sale on Friday, June 12, 10am to 9pm and Saturday June 13, 10am to 6pm at Friends House, 60 Lowther Avenue (convenient to the St. George subway station.)  Free attendance. The official opening with refreshments will be on June 12 at 6pm. Wheelchair Accessible.

Our poster features a self-portrait that was sold at our most recent show. The painting of the blindfolded woman is by Badri Motamedi who was arrested while a university student and imprisoned in Iran for her political activity against the brutality of the Islamic government.  Motamedi spent four months of her five prison years blindfolded in solitary confinement. During that ordeal, she imagined herself a cocoon that one day would become a butterfly. Several years after her release, she painted In Hope of Being Butterflies.

The Quaker Committee for Refugees has organized at least five art shows in the past, giving refugee newcomers an opportunity to share their feelings and sell their work at no charge to themselves.

For more information: email Eusebio Garcia at Quakercommittee4refugees@gmail.com or telephone 416-964-9669. Garcia initiated the series of shows and was himself a refugee. He works full time helping refugees in Canada.