Art is often used as a form of healing after a traumatic event. People look for ways to express themselves, using the pain and hurt in their world to inspire and create.
For Camp Fire survivors, the world of art is not lost to them. The area around Paradise and Chico is very creative, with artists living directly in Chico, but with many others living up on the Ridge in the woods.
Musicians, artists, writers, and other creators were all impacted when the Camp Fire came through their towns. Besides worrying about losing homes, pets, belongings, and sometimes, loved ones, a lot of the artists in the area lost thousands of their pieces and their supplies.
“I personally lost all my art work in the fire, years and years of art work, some stored in boxes and some framed on my walls,” said Renee Goularte.
Goularte lived on the Ridge, in a small town just outside of Paradise, called Magalia. After the fire, she only had a few photographs remaining of her work; just shells of what she used to have.
The Camp Fire is a story of loss; a narrative that continues to repeat itself even months after the fire. For a number of creators in the area, the loss has restricted their ability to create.
Besides so many losing their pieces in the fire, they lost their spaces to create, their supplies, and in some cases, their muses.
In the area, a number of groups are trying to help out the artists of the area. Facebook groups have been created to help different artists in the area share their stories about what the lost. On the page, there are calls for supplies, but also calls for excess supplies that are up for donation.
The Paradise Art Center is trying to do what it can to support artists in the area. Donations are accepted in an attempt to help the artists of the area that lost everything. Different fundraisers have been established to help a number of areas of the arts.
In March, Ed Asner came up to Theatre on the Ridge, a production theater in Paradise that survived the fire, to help raise money for the community and the theater itself.
Throughout the communities that were affected by the Camp Fire there’s that continual story of lost, but there are stories of coming together and working to recreate what the fire took from them.
And what better way to do this through art?
The fire was extremely traumatic for so many, including a lot of the young people of the area. This is why Erin Haley started a program so young people could express themselves through drumming.
Haley, who has a private practice in music therapy, received a grant after the fire where she was able use her knowledge about music therapy to a number of young people in the area. With groups from elementary school children to teenagers, they’re able to come together and release a lot of their anger and frustration, but while doing this, create something.
“It’s so nice that it’s highly valued,” said Haley about music and the arts in the area since the fire.
In the long-term recovery process for Paradise and the surrounding areas, there’s a focus on the arts.
Events are planned for the future to revolve directly around the arts. Song writing events, fundraisers to have art be a core part of the healing process for the young people of the community, and just the overall
Art, while painful to others, can be healing for some. Take for instance, the artists at the 1078 Gallery. At the end of April, the gallery sponsored a showcase called “Remembered: Art Honoring Loss from the Camp Fire.”
The small space could have been overlooked by anyone driving by, but once inside the space, the art for the exhibition was able to tell stories that sometimes words weren’t able to.
When Rebecca Wallace and Rebecca Shelly came up with the idea that would eventually turn into the exhibition, they were looking for a way to help the Camp Fire survivors in the way that they knew: through their art.
They created a Facebook group where those impacted by the fire could share their stories about what they lost in the fire. Over 40 artists from around California and the world agreed to take part and create pieces for not only the gallery, but ultimately the survivors themselves.
Some artists themselves were impacted. Take Jessica Vega. During the Camp Fire, she lost her own home and much of her family had to move in together after the fire.
“We’ve been through worse,” said Vega. “It really puts perspective everything.”
For the showcase, she created a piece out of wood to honor an item her neighbor had lost in the fire.
Vega also was part of the Butte College class that helped curate the exhibition. In the hours leading up to its opening, her, along with a few of her classmates, were working to make sure that every story and every name card was perfect.
One of the pieces at the gallery was a recreation of a lost portrait from the fire. The drawing showed a young man in a military uniform, smiling as he looked off to the side. While the photo was lost forever, the drawing came from that loss.
One of the most notable stories from the Camp Fire was a story about art. Shane Grammar, an artist who was from Chico, but later moved to Los Angeles, started creating pieces of street art on the ruins of homes and other buildings in Paradise.
The area is extremely creative. Just driving through Chico, there are pieces of work everywhere. Huge murals, sculptures, street art. It all gives off this creative energy, a sense that the entire area is so creative and how important art is.
Now six months after the fire, the art is starting to come back. Bands that were affected from the fire are playing again in Chico. Spaces are being found for those who want to create.
What was lost from the Camp Fire can never really be replaced.
But maybe it could fuel the creative spark to create from it.