Pictures: Mural painting day at The 39 Club proves Bognor needs youth provision

For Heike Rentel, a senior youth worker at The 39 Club on Church Path, ‘art is the great leveller’; a mechanism through which young and old, rich and poor, can rediscover their shared humanity, even if they might not think so at first.

“Most people, if you talk about art, will immediately assume ‘oh I can’t draw’ because that’s what they’ve been taught. They think of artists as weird people who hang canvases in galleries and are terribly important,” she explained.

To redress that balance, and introduce young people to the world of artistic expression, Mrs Rentel organised a mural painting day for young people at The 39 Club.

Working with spray-painting charity U CAN Spray, the children and teens donned their masks, shook up their cans and produced a stunning space-themed mural on the wall outside their club.

“With something like this, they can look at it and say ‘oh, actually art is for me’. It opens up that world to them,” Mrs Rentel said.

“If I get my oils out, most of the young people will go ‘oh no, I can’t do that,’ but if I get my chalks out or the spray paint, they’ll have a go. It’s a newer, younger medium.”

Alongside giving Bognor’s young people a rare opportunity to impact their surroundings, to claim meaningful ownership of a space, Mrs Rentel said the project has other, less immediately tangible benefits.

“It’s wonderful for the children’s self-esteem and it helps some of them academically, because all of a sudden they think ‘oh I can do something.’

“And, of course, from the spraying that leads naturally into other forms of creativity. They might want to experiment with other kinds of art.

“And as a bonus, they’ll all be getting an Arts Award certificate, a proper qualification. And the kids who want to will be able to carry on. The Arts Council do this really nifty award, which can wind up as an A level equivalent.

“All the kids are young, so they’ve a ways to go for that, but this is something they can engage with.”

It’s almost impossible not to see the mural in the context of the ongoing threats to youth provision in Bognor Regis.

The 39 Club exists in an annex attached to what was once Bognor’s FinditOut Centre: a facility dedicated to providing advice, support, and activities for young people.

It was closed, alongside The Phoenix Centre, on Westloats Lane, in November last year after both services were deemed surplus to requirements by West Sussex County Council, meaning The 39 Club is now one of the last remaining services providing dedicated youth provision in the area.

In order to give the club more space, facilities and resources, the club’s parent charity, Sussex Clubs for Young People, has partnered with local organisations like U Can Spray and Bognorphenia to take control of both empty facilities.

Despite a great deal of momentum, there’s still no guarantee the bid will work and, if it doesn’t, if the facilities go elsewhere, that could mean the end of The 39 Club, and the end of mural-painting projects like this.

“(If we lose the space) I just don’t know what will happen,” Mrs Rentel said.

“Maybe we can run sessions outside but that’s obviously rather restrictive and if it starts raining, it’s all over. There are just so many more things I can do inside, with the proper space.” For more on this visit bognor.co.uk.