CoveCare Center’s 2023 InspiRED Events Produce Masterpieces
It was an amazing week of creativity and connections for participants at the 3rd annual InspiRED event. InspiRED is a series of community events started by CoveCare Center’s Prevention Educators to celebrate Red Ribbon Week, a national awareness week to educate youth and encourage participation in drug prevention activities. This year’s InspiRED included four free parent-teen art nights across Putnam County.
The week started at Brewster Public Library where artist Sarah Miller Totten instructed attendees to paint an autumn scene with birds. Parents and their teens worked together, blending colors, and applying brush strokes onto canvas. Jackson Malloy, a sixth-grade participant said, “The best part about painting is that no matter what you do, it’s always art.”
CoveCare Center Prevention Educator Jillian Kulkaand artist Candace Winter welcomed more participants to Garrison Art Center on the second evening, and stated, “Children of parents who talk to them regularly about drugs are 42% less likely to use drugs than those who don’t; yet only a quarter of teens report having these conversations. Parents who have a positive relationship with their children and start to have conversations early and often about drugs and alcohol make a difference in how children make safe and healthy choices about substances. Parents are a very important part of prevention.”
The following night, several more pairs of parents and teens joined artist Terry Fokine at the Putnam Arts Council in Mahopac to paint a beautiful water scene. Parent Carrie Riorden painted with her son Aiden and commented, “The beauty of the masterpiece is your own unique touch.”
InspiRED closed out at Arts on The Lake in Kent Lakes, where Sarah Miller Totten brought the serenity of a mountain vista to participants.
With another Red Ribbon Week coming to an end, Kulka said, “I am thrilled that InspiRED is now in its third year. We are beyond grateful to the community organizations and artists who partner with us to offer this free prevention activity to the families of Putnam. The Prevention Educators look forward to bringing InspiRED to the community again next year!”
