Richmond Has Heart

Now more than ever we know that Richmond has heart.

The City of Richmond has unveiled a campaign aimed at bringing the community, residents and businesses together to show their support for those working to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and to explore new and meaningful ways to find connection while maintaining physical distancing protocols.

We're asking the residents of Richmond to share uplifting news, cheer on our front line and essential workers, get creative in staying connected but apart, and gather the good news using the hashtag #RichmondHasHeart.

We'll be sharing stories, videos, artwork and photos on our social media channels in the coming days and weeks ahead.

Facebook	Instagram	Twitter

• Post a message or heart in your window as a sign of encouragement for your neighbours, front line workers and community
• Share a message of appreciation for frontline workers on your social media
• If you see something shareable in your neighbourhood, snap a photo and share
• DIY, we'd love to see your creative mind at work and how you show that #RichmondHasHeart

• Use the hashtag #RichmondHasHeart
• Tag @funRichmond on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

Public Art Projects
Richmond’s Public Art Program launched four artist-initiated projects in 2020 as part of the #RichmondHasHeart campaign. The projects by local artists Keely O’Brien, Lou Sheppard, Denise Fong, Christy Fong and Marina Szijarto promoted mental health, well-being and creativity while maintaining physical distancing protocols and fostering community connections during this unprecedented, destabilizing and challenging time. 

Eating in the Time of COVID
by Christy Fong and Denise Fong
Eating in the Time of COVID-19 is an online collection of stories, quotes, photos, poems and illustrations that captures culturally diverse and multigenerational experiences with food during the coronavirus pandemic. The project is ongoing until fall 2021 and will engage The Sharing Farm Society, Richmond Food Security Society, local farmers, grocery store owners, restaurateurs, food bloggers and the general public in Richmond, in answer to the question: How has your relationship with food changed since the pandemic? The website will function as the online exhibition and as a legacy piece to document the voices, feelings, and visual representations of the COVID-19 experience. A short video will also be produced and shown as part of the online exhibition. For more information on this project, visit: richmondfoodstories.ca

Dearest
by Keely O’Brien
Dearest was a community art project that encouraged connection, interpersonal exchange and safe methods of social contact through the lens of creative snail mail. Participants signed up online to receive a pack of three artist-designed, pre-stamped blank postcards in the mail that they could fill out with messages of love and encouragement and mail on to friends and loved ones. The project responded to the experience of loneliness, grief and isolation felt by many in the community.

Murmurations: A Score for Social Distancing
By Lou Sheppard
Murmurations: A Score for Social Distancing was a choreographic notation for seven dancers. Based on the movements of birds flying in a flock, the choreography invited dancers to perform an interconnected set of movements while never coming within two metres of each other. The temporary work was installed on the parking lot in front of Lansdowne Mall and referenced the social distancing directions that we now see in public spaces. Murmurations invited visitors to follow the directional markings on the pavement, like an interconnected hopscotch, and perform the dance.

Loving: Memories
by Marina Szijarto
Loving: Memories was a community engagement project to honour those we have lost. Following easy, illustrated instructions and design guidelines, Richmond residents were invited to create secular memorial shrines in memory of loved ones or to honour someone special in the community (or elsewhere). Displayed in household windows, the shrines were illuminated by electric candles; thus, within neighbourhoods and through these beacons of light, community members expressed and witnessed each other’s mourning and humanity, connected through the honouring of those we have lost during these unprecedented times.

Image credit: Keely O’Brien, "Dearest", 2021. Courtesy of the Artist.

The current exhibition showcases the work of Richmond artists Glen Anderson, Fanny Bok Yin Tang and Keely O’Brien who have created work in response to the theme of Hope, Resilience and Strength. This exhibition is on display until August 14 and is part of the #RichmondHasHeart campaign, an initiative that aims to bring the community, residents and businesses together to show their support for those working to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and to explore new and meaningful ways to find connection while maintaining physical distancing protocols. For more information visit: No. 3 Road Art Columns 

Printable graphics
Here are some downloadable graphics to get you started! Print, colour and share!
 #RichmondHasHeart Colouring Sheet
 #RichmondHasHeart Full Colour