We provide the next generation of creative change-makers with unique opportunities to MAKE and SHARE media that matters
About Us
What is Access To Media Society?
AMES has been investing in the imaginations and skill sets of up-and-coming media artists, digital activists and creative change makers for over two decades.
AMES is a bi-regional organization. Many of our projects take place on xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) and Sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) territories, and that’s where lots of our collaborators and participants hail from too. But the birth place of AMES is the unsurrendered territory of the Penelakut people, and 12 other Hul’q’umi’num speaking Nations who hold rights and responsibilities in and around the place that’s come to be known as Galiano Island.
Stories that move: transforming ourselves and the wider world
DisPLACEment
DisPLACEment centres the stories, creative visions, and perspectives of indigenous and newcomer youth, models peer-education and helps build motivation for change by delving into timely and critical equity issues.
HumanEYES
Bridging Cultures and Generations through arts-based migration and food-focused storytelling
Digital Forage
Digital Forage is a wild-food focused intergenerational digital storytelling program that involves reciprocal knowledge-sharing between Galiano and Penelakut artists, elders, and youth.
During our initial research interviews, mentors and facilitators shared what they’d learned about Community Digital Storytelling (CDS), based on their years of experience. All of the program designs discussed here share characteristics with the first model we looked at: Working with Communities as a Filmmaker and Mentor. In the original workshop design, an organization (National Film Board of Canada, gallery gachet, Artsbridge, Give Peace a Chance etc.) contracts a filmmaker to work with a specific community to co-create short video projects.
Community Digital Storytelling grows out of our experiences in the world, shared as stories. Our strategy, as mentors developing new approaches to storytelling, is to create and hold open a receptive and welcoming space.
“I really look at digital storytelling as a way to empower our people because we have so many stories, and so much to share that’s often ignored and overlooked.” – Chris Bose
