Messengers Tutors

Roger coordinates the implementation of the Messengers program and supervises staff who provide the art classes and support. He works closely with the program’s social worker who supports vulnerable young people in the program and the professional artists who act as tutors, to deliver the sessions within the program aims and guidelines. Roger is responsible for collating data, notes and outcome reports to assist in measuring the effectiveness of program and in identifying gaps which may need to be filled. He also works with to actively develop relationships with other organisations and program providers who support vulnerable young people.

Kelsey has been with the Tuggeranong Arts Centre since 2015 and as youth support worker for the Messengers Program she is responsible for engaging and supporting young people through the program. Kelsey is currently completing her Master of Psychology at the University of New England. In Messengers, Kelsey works creatively to engage young people back into their communities, build support networks, address challenges, and encourage young people to reach their goals. Kelsey is passionate about working with and empowering young people who experience mental health issues to reach their goals and she appreciates the powerful positive impacts that the arts have on personal wellbeing and mental health recovery. 

Bryce was a participant of the Messengers program for two years as a teenager and has been further developing himself as an arts assistant in the program. Bryce is an emerging artist specialising in printmaking, painting, drawing and mixed media street art.  In 2018, he was the recipient of the Rotary Youth Art Award. As part of Tuggeranong Arts Centre, STILE Mentorship Program he developed and facilitated two successful street art workshops with young people in Woden.

Lily Platts (she/her) is a visual artist living and working  on Ngunnawal land. Lily explores themes of the everyday and is drawn to the way people are reflected within the objects she paints. Platts has exhibited in several group shows and had recent solo shows at Michael Reid Southern highlands an Gaffa Gallery. She was a recipient of the 2020 Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship after graduating with Honours from RMIT, Melbourne in 2019 and from ANU in 2017. Lily has been teaching a range of classes at TAC for the last 2 years and loves sharing her passion for art with the Tuggeranong community. 

Emma Rani Hodges’s work explores their mixed Thai, Chinese and Australian heritage. Working in mixed media, their work draws on personal narratives and inserts marginalised voices into the dominant discourse of monocultural Australia. Hodges’s teaching experience includes tutoring with the Messengers program and the Make Art at TAC program here at Tuggeranong Arts Centre, previously volunteering as a teaching assistant for Hands on Studio, assisting in teaching the community planting and environmental care techniques for the Climate Factory as well as having a position teaching English to recently arrived refugees and migrants. Hodges has done this all while running their own workshops alongside artworks and exhibitions.

Kate joined the Messengers team in 2023 and aims to bring her energy to the program as an assistant. Kate spent time in the program as a participant for many years and has recently graduated college. Kate holds a Certificate III in Early Childhood Education and is currently completing her Diploma. She is a fulltime Educator and enjoys painting, drawing and riding her horse, Barbie.