all of your secrets are safe here with me

Xai Chamberlain “I am an artist from Peterborough. I attended school at St. Peters and recently graduated. I have had an interest in art ever since I was a little kid. My mom started me on my artistic journey through arts and crafts. It has grown to be an integral part of me, and I love to express my thoughts and emotions through art. I like to work in acrylic paint, oil pastel, crayons, glitter, and honestly, any mixed media! I hope to make people feel emotions through my work.”

Emilie Kenny “I am a 17-year-old artist, and I have struggled with perfectionism. It was restricting my creativity, binding it to the standards that I had believed were there for art. I have grown tired of perfection. I find beauty in subjects that look broken. It’s fun to create art and make strokes without plan or purpose. At this point in my life, chaos is comfort. Allowing my art to embrace disorganization is a way for me to emphasize the instability of life and normalize imperfection—something that I find important.”


Wilhem Hirschmann is a 16-year-old visual artist who has had a passion for the arts from a very young age. For over a decade, he has been taking art classes at the Art School of Peterborough and has since participated in local gallery shows whenever the opportunity arose. Recently, Wilhem has focused on portraiture, specializing in painting. He draws inspiration mainly from the expressionist and impressionist movements, and his goal is to become a professional artist.

Nahdia R is a young black artist situated in Peterborough, Ontario. Making art since she was 5 years old, she mainly creates sculptural works using clay, acrylic, and repurposed items. Though she has a more childlike style, Nahdia uses her own experiences to comment on social issues including racism and various forms of abuse.

Dhanu Wegapitiya “I was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka. I lived there for 13/14 years of my life before my parents decided to move to Peterborough. It was a pretty new place, but in the best way possible. Here, people can express who they are, choose what they want to be, and have a better education. And I wanted to take full advantage of that. I did have a troubling past, but coming here changed it. I met people who genuinely like me the way I am. I got to grow and become more mature; maturity doesn’t come normally that early back in Sri Lanka. I always loved doing art, ever since I was a child. I won medals in art competitions, but that was just me doing art. I hadn’t yet grasped the concept that art can mean something until starting high school art courses here in Canada. After finding out, I dove headfirst into making artwork that represents me, what I feel, love, hate, and more! I love art, but I don’t plan on doing it as my job as I am more interested in forensic psychology. Art has been a part of most of my life. Even though most artworks’ meanings are cloaked and intentionally vague, I can express myself without needing to be explicit. A way to show who I really am without needing to defend myself. I let my art defend and show who I really am under a cloak that I am not ready to pull off”