Lee Ann Thill at The Butter Compartment has declared September 1st the very first official Diabetes Art Day. If you would like to participate, between now and September 1st, break out of your linguistic comfort zone, bust out some art materials, and make a piece of artwork – painting, drawing, collage, sculpture, an installation piece, a mixed media something or other, or whatever you can imagine.
Most of you probably don’t consider yourself an artist, but you don’t have to be an artist or have had formal art education to have fun making art. Art is a language everyone can speak, and everyone understands. It doesn’t matter if you’re young or old, it doesn’t matter if you have type 1, type 2, or another form of diabetes, it doesn’t matter if you’re a loved one or a health care professional. If you want to get your family involved, maybe each of you can create something because all of you are touched by diabetes. The more people who jump into the art-making action, the better.
When September 1st comes around, share the expression of your creativity. If you want to say something about it – what it was like to make it, if it turned out the way you expected, what it means to you – then go for it, but if you just want to post a picture of it, and let it speak for itself, the magic of art is that words are optional.
We want to join together and wallpaper the Diabetes Online Community with our visual expressions of diabetes. If you are a member of TuDiabetes, post it here on TuDiabetes (in the Express Your Diabetes page). If you belong to other diabetes online communities, post it there. If you have your own blog, post it there. If you have a Facebook profile, make it your profile picture for the day and post it on your wall. If you have a Twitter account, you can make it your profile picture, and post a link to wherever you’ve posted your art. You can even send it to Lee Ann (at The Butter Compartment) if you want, and she will post it on her blog on September 1st. You can even do all of the above!
Tell your friends in the diabetes community, grab the Diabetes Art Day badge from The Butter Compartment and use it to show everyone that you plan to participate in this online diabetes event. Then all that’s left is tuning into your instincts, sense of adventure, and playfulness so you can create something fantastic, and post it on September 1st.
This is a community art project like no other for a community like no other, so help make it fabulous!
