Sharing human rights stories through the arts.
What We Do
From bold new murals across the city to unforgettable slams, showcases, and mentorships that empowered youth artists to lead with confidence, 2024 was a year to remember. Explore our Impact Report to see it all.
A year-round arts and social justice training program for equity-deserving youth from across the GTA that leads to mentorship and employment opportunities as well as an annual major exhibition for the public.
Our annual multi-day event that celebrates the intersection of the arts and human rights including films, a poetry slam, youth-led exhibitions, and more!
What Does It Really Mean to Share Space?
JAYU has spent the last year in reflecting on how we could better support our community at a time when arts spaces are closing, shifting, or just plain struggling to stay afloat.This guide is for community organizers rethinking how they host, nonprofits sharing resources without burning out their teams, and artists navigating the gap between vision and infrastructure.
There’s no one-size-fits-all playbook for this work. But we hope our reflections, frameworks, and honest questions can serve as a starting point for your own.
JAYU is a registered Canadian charity and a leader in the space where the arts and human rights intersect.
We believe strongly that the arts provide the strongest platform to share human rights stories. The arts can be used to educate, to build empathy, to heal, to forge community and to inspire the kinds of conversations necessary to reimagine a more just and equitable world.
Guided by our dedicated team of staff, artists, educators and our Board of Directors, our year-round programming includes our annual JAYU Festival of the Arts, and our iAM programming.