Veterans Art Gallery opens in southwestern Ont.

CTV London’s Sean Irvine with an art program to help support veterans and first responders who are dealing with PTSD.

A first-of-its-kind veterans art gallery and therapy centre has opened in Port Stanley. It showcases canvases designed to lift the dark clouds of veterans and first responders.

Like many veterans of the Canadian Army and policing, James Ageson lives with the scars of PTSD.

“We become lost, that’s really what happens,” he told CTV News London as he attempted to describe the injury he suffered.

A little more than half a decade ago, Ageson was in a much different place than he is now as the founder of the Veterans Art Gallery.

“I was isolated, like a lot of us were,” he explained. “I drank…I was a mess.”

But in 2022, he found peace through art classes and a mentorship with a local artist. It helped to turn his life around and later the lives of countless others.

A door on Main Street leads to the concept Ageson created.

“We here at the Veterans Art Gallery and Wellness Center help people transition from work life back into civilian life,” he explained.

The artwork taught, and later displayed, is part of the healing process from in-service mental and physical injuries.

Ageson says some portraits depict an escape from the past, while others confront trauma.

“The pain that’s in the paintings. And sometimes we can’t tell our story to someone else, but we can tell it through painting,” he explained.

Military veteran Viola O’Quinn-Page has discovered peace through canvas.

“No judgment, no stories. You can come in if you don’t want, don’t want to talk, you don’t have to talk,” she said.

While the gallery is self-sufficient, it is seeking public and private funding to meet the growing waiting list of veterans.

“We have people that we could be helping right now, and we just don’t have the funds,” said Ageson.

Sales at the gallery since its opening last year are up, with some portraits fetching as much as $4,000.

40 per cent goes back into programs, the rest to the artists, who are elated when their work sells.

“So, it brings you that pride. It brings you. Your family sees your smile, and you know that helps everyone,” said O’Quinn-Page.

The Veterans Art Gallery is open Wednesday through Sunday.