Three years after opening its doors in the historical Sutton creamery, the Sutton School of Art has expanded on its artistic and creative opportunities with the goal of providing children between 3 and 17 years old with a space for exploration and discovery and helping build connections between different communities in the Eastern Townships and beyond. 

The Sutton School of Art isn’t your typical ‘school.’ There is no such thing as a classroom, there is no curriculum or evaluation grid, and the focus isn’t necessarily on learning. According to founder Anne-Marie Lavigne, the Sutton School of Art is all about providing children with the chance to meet artists and helping them "find a sense of belonging” within their communities through this collaboration and experimenting with a variety of art disciplines.

To ensure that it fulfills its mission, the Sutton School of Art has more recently implemented concrete actions to ensure that its activities and programming are accessible to both the French and English-speaking communities in Sutton and its surrounding areas. This includes bringing a cultural liaison worker on its team for the English-speaking communities, having interpreters available to provide translation services, hosting bilingual art camps, and outreaching to the different schools, community groups, and organizations that serve the area's English-speaking communities. 

There are also plans to incorporate other minority languages at the Sutton School of Art, including Indigenous languages, and working with organizations on the other side of the border in the United States.

For Lavigne, bringing different communities together around the arts is a “long-term investment and a long-term engagement,” and the Sutton School of Art hopes to continue implementing projects that will provide for collective experiences.

To hear more on the Sutton School of Art and its evolution, listen to CIDI’s interview with Lavigne and member of the Sutton School of Art team Mikaël Theimer below: