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Evolve or Die: CMA Conference

I’ll be heading up to London, Ontario on Thursday, April 14 to speak on a panel with some incredible people as part of the Canadian Museum Association’s Annual Conference, appropriately titled, Evolve or Die!. I’m pumped to get to reconnect with Andrew Hunter and Andrew Lochhead, and to finally meet Yael Filipovic. Not familiar with these folks? You should be.

The details:

The Social, Political, and Local: The Power of Place

Moderator: Yael Filipovic, Foreman Art Gallery, Bishop’s University
Panelists:Andrew Hunter, Dodolab & Proboscis; Justin Langlois, Broken City Lab, Andrew Lochhead, Workers Arts and Heritage Center

Embracing new roles, forging new relationships, and charting new territory on the notion of place has proven to facilitate new kinds of relationships with communities that allow for increasingly socially responsible work within our institutions. Through a dialogue that explores the critical relationships, the panelists have taken with the notion of place, this discussion will engage in unpacking the politics at play in work engaged with local spaces, communities, and histories and how this plays a part in a broader role we may be asked to play as facilitators of social change at local and regional levels.

And, afterwards, we’ll be meeting with some folks in London who are working to make that city better — will be a great day!

 

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Rust Belt to Artist Belt III in Detroit

On Wednesday, April 6th I will be headed across the border to the College for Creative Studies, A. Alfred Taubman Centre for Design Education in Detroit for the Rust Belt to Artist Belt III conference to participate on a panel named Lab Culture: Hands on Think Tanks for Cities, with five other amazing individuals.

Conference participants will explore how economic and community development, entrepreneurialism, and land use in post-industrial Rust Belt cities are being shaped by creative individuals. Attendees will examine best practices for connecting creative practitioners with advanced manufacturers to establish a “Creative Supply Chain.”

Check out the jam-packed schedule and links to panelist and moderator bios here. With over 50 speakers in two days, this is going to be AMAZING.

Hope to see you there!

 

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Borderlands Symposium: University of Maine

Next week, I’ll be headed to the University of Maine at Farmington to present at the Borderlands Symposium, assembled by our friends, TUG Collective. Here’s the brief on the symposium:

A series of talks, workshops, performances, and films that will illuminate some of the social, economic, political and ecological nuances along North America’s borders, and catalyze our attention to how various individuals, either acting alone or collaboratively, are actively creating transnational communities in which “our destinies and aspirations are in one another’s hands.”

Along with Lee Rodney, curator of the Border Bookmobile and border research extraordinaire, I’ll also be initiating a new project idea based on the legends of Paul Bunyan. It sounds absurd, yes, but so are the border realities that we face. The legends around Bunyan are such that there’s plenty of room to initiate a new conversation around the histories of the North American border – -Bunyan becomes a tool, a lens for exploring a series of histories and geographies.

We are proposing to read between the lines of these histories to see the changing representations of Mr. Bunyan and to propose other stories of how we might re-view him in the 21st century: could he be considered among the early architects of NAFTA ? A subversive border crosser, roaming freely through the Northern territories between Canada and the US ?

Those questions are tied to a number of workshops and group discussions we’ll be giving along with a panel discussion with the always incredible Riccardo Dominguez and Dan Millis.

I’m anxious to share some of our ongoing How to Forget the Border Completely research, it’s going to be a fun three days.

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Make It Work: Exhibition & Panel Discussion

I’m excited to note that in addition to the current exhibition, Make It Work, on at SoVA Projects Gallery (nee LeBel Gallery) featuring work by Michelle, a new poster installation that I did, and a ton of other incredible local Windsor-Detroit artists, there’s a panel discussion featuring guests from across the country.

If you’re remotely interested in some of the things we talk about here on the blog, you should really make a point of attending the reception and panel discussion on Thursday, February 3rd, starting at 5:30pm.

From the description of the panel discussion:

While the idea of creative economies has become commonplace in large cultural centres, there has been less consideration of the possibilities and challenges of working in economically distressed cities that are at a distance from cultural capitals and the art market.

Research into the trend of shrinking cities in recent years has drawn attention to the question of how to consider cities that are losing population and basic infrastructure. Possible answers to the problems raised by shrinking cities have not been coming from economists or politicians, but from artists, designers and architects.

Discussions will arise around questions such as:

What might locality and local production mean when two cities are located on an international border? What role do artists and grassroots organizations have in redefining local realities? How do ethnic, racial, religious, and cultural realities play out in negotiations of place and identity, and how can these negotiations posit new sorts of regional or global identities? And what might local mean in the Detroit-Windsor region, for example, where some creative practices are focused on audiences at the scale of the neighbourhood or even the block, while others seek audiences far beyond?

The Panel Discussion runs 6:30-9 pm SoVA Projects Gallery University of Windsor Huron Church Road @ College Avenue and features Anthony Kiendl (Director, Plug In Institute for Contemporary Art, Winnipeg, MB) Shauna McCabe (Director, Canadian Textile Museum, Toronto ON; Canada Research Chair, Mt. Alison University, NB) Andrew Herscher (Assistant Professor, Taubman School of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, and co-founder of The Detroit Unreal Estate Agency) J. Monte Martinez (Creative Director, 555 Arts, Detroit, MI) Justin Langlois (Lecturer, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Windsor; Director Broken City Lab, Windsor, ON)

Moderator: Lee Rodney (Associate Professor, Art History and Visual Culture, University of Windsor; Curator of the Border Bookmobile, Windsor, ON)
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OPENED/UP: a Walk on November 30th

OPENED UP: A walk through lost, forgotten, vacant, and underused spaces.

For an hour and a half after work on Tuesday, November 30, we’ll be walking around downtown Windsor and getting access to a variety of closed / vacant / underused spaces. Justin Langlois will be guiding it with Tom Lucier and we’re hoping to have a lot of ambitious and excited people out with us. City-owned buildings, privately held storefronts, and cavernous bingo halls are all a part of our route, and you’re invited to join us in imagining a different downtown for our city — one with ample, affordable, and exciting spaces for artists, performers, musicians, and other creative-minded folks. We want to start a real conversation about what it would take to get these spaces filled with people who need them. We want to help give people a reason to be excited about being a practicing artist in this city again. We know that finding space needs to be at the top of that list, and we want to help.

This walk has been organized as part of the Artscape Creative Placemaking workshop being held on December 1st. Artscape, if you’re not already familiar with their work, has brought together and led numerous partners and stakeholders to realize massive studio and live/work retrofits of a variety of underused spaces in Toronto and figured out ways to make spaces for artists not only affordable, but integral to the surrounding neighbourhoods and economies. This walk has been something on our to-do list for a while and Artscape’s workshop just gave us the perfect excuse to do it.

Meet us at Phog Lounge at 5pm sharp. We’ll wind our way through the downtown core and head back to Phog for some food, drinks, and lots of conversation. We really want you to be there, let us know if you have any questions.

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You’re Invited: Artist Talks, Conferences, and other upcoming events

There’s a lot of BCL-related events coming up…

First off, I’ll be giving an artist talk at the University of Windsor’s School of Visual Arts tomorrow, November 16 at 12noon. I’ll be discussing Broken City Lab and how I think about collaborative social practice in general. The talk along with follow up questions should run for about an hour — it’s the perfect way to spend your lunch hour. You’re invited!

Details for other events are below, but here are the important parts:

  • November 18th – Windsor + Philosophy
  • November 30th – OPENED UP: A walk through lost, forgotten, vacant, and underused spaces.
  • December 1st – Artscape Placemaking Workshop

Continue reading “You’re Invited: Artist Talks, Conferences, and other upcoming events”

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We Like Music, We Love Detroit

As Michelle mentioned last week, we’re doing a projection inside of The Magic Stick as part of the We Like Music Festival in Detroit this Saturday, September 18.

The organizers of We Like Music invited us to do something — so, we figured we would come up with a great big list of things we love about Detroit and then open it up to additions and have that list projected, line by line, onto the inside of th Magic Stick. We’ll be adding to that list in real-time that night using the magic of Twitter.

There’s a ton of amazing music and we’re truly lucky to be able to work alongside the other visual artists lined up for the evening. It’s going to be fun. See you there!!!

To get tickets, check out http://www.welikemusicfestival.com/tickets/

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The Storefront Residencies for Social Innovation: Launching June 11, 2010

For 30 days, this project will call on over 25 different artists, writers, designers, restauranteurs, musicians, architects, archivists, and other interested parties to occupy a space in downtown Windsor for up to one month in June and July 2010 to attempt to intervene with the everyday realities of skyrocketing vacancy rates, failing economic strategies, and a place in need of new imagination.

We’ve been planning this for months, and we’re incredibly excited to see it finally launch this Friday, June 11, 2010.

Michelle will be posting constantly for the next month, and we’ll be noting the open and close times for each day soon. In the meantime,  feel free to download the entire schedule in PDF.

The Schedule: All projects take place in either 406, 410 or 424 Pelissier Street in downtown Windsor.

Participants

Dates

Project Description

Daragh Sankey
 (Toronto, ON)

June 10 – 13

June 17 – 20

June 25 – July 11

How To Make a Documentary: Live documentation of the residency in its entirety/video editing workshops.

Jolie Inthavong
 (Windsor, ON)

June 11 –17

The Breakroom: A Profit-Free Cafe and Lunch.

Eric Cheung
(Toronto, ON)

June 11 – 21

Creation of an interior urban green park.

Andrea Carvalho
 (Montreal, QC)

June 11 – 21

A series of actions and tactics challenging Windsor-specific Non-Places.

Julie René de Cotret & Jefferson Campbell-Cooper
(Guelph, ON)

June 11 – 23

The Peoples Museum & Fabulations de Windsor: Bilingual community-based story telling and story gathering.

Sara French
 (Vancouver, BC)

June 11 – July 8

Norman Eberstein: An interactive, live performance involving surveillance cameras and a security guard at work.

Nicole Grinstead
 (Montreal, QC)

June 13 – 19

Swap Shop.

Jodi Green
(Windsor, ON)

June 14 – 25

The Sweater Factory: process-based performance involving the unraveling and re-assembly of sweaters.

(Department of Unusual Certainties)
 (Toronto, ON)

June 15 – July 11

Storefront Success Stories: Based on admiration for the local shopkeeper, the project aims to create new connections, knowledge, and theories between Windsor’s different businesses, people, and sites of productivity.

Kero (Windsor, ON / Detroit, MI)

June 17 – 20

An interactive motion-sensored installation engaging outside pedestrians and interior viewers.

Leesa Bringas (Windsor, ON)

June 18 – 30

Collaborative letter-writing campaign to vacant homes on Indian Road.

Stephen Surlin (Windsor, ON

June 20 – 29

An experimenting / prototyping / recording research phase for the collecting of urban sounds through contact microphones.

Terre Chartrand, Garth Rennie, Zoey Heath, Phil Beaudoin
 (Windsor, ON & Kitchener / Waterloo, ON)

June 20 – 27

A visual exchange between Kitchener-Waterloo and Windsor: a ride down the highway dialog through photographic and sound experience.

Lea Bucknell
 (BC/London, ON)

June 22 – July 1

June 30, 7pm (opening)

Community-shaped, Interactive Interior garden space.

Thea Jones
(Montreal, QC)

June 23 – 26

Multimedia installation using process-based research of the Detroit-Windsor bridge and tunnel which cross the Detroit River.

Thom Provost
 (Windsor, ON)

June 24 – 30

Storefront projection installation using Google Street View stills of Windsor.

Denise St Marie
 (Toronto, ON)

June 25 – 27

Talk To Strangers: a text-based outdoor window installation.

Ayesha Drouillard & Nicolette Westfall
 (Windsor, ON)

June 27, 28, July 4, 5 (workshops), July 7-8 (show)

IMAGINATION LAB: walk-in art workshops for kids accompanied by their caregivers.

Merry Ellen Scully Mosna
(Windsor, ON)

June 28 – 29

Portraits, Pies and Peace: Sunday afternoon discussions, and sharing of homemade pie, plus some drawing and painting.

Logan Davis
(Windsor, ON)

June 28 – July 1

Interactive Light Board Window Installation.

Robin Fitzsimons
 (Toronto, ON)

June 28 – July 2

Donation-based in-store training to improve gambling skills – geared towards subverting the economy in Windsor.

Doodle Heads: Elizabeth Prosser & Nicolette Westfall
 (Windsor, ON)

June 29, 30 (workshops),

July 1-July 3 (show)

Graffiti Workshops and Showing.

Joshua Babcock
 (Windsor, ON)

June 29 – July 11

Invention and Solution Hub (ISH): ongoing brainstorming and mapping activity.

Brad Tinmouth
 (Toronto, ON)

June 30 – July 2

Pro-Click Factory: digital, interactive open-mic nights. An evening lecture and their techniques for cultivating the best YouTube videos.

Laura Paolini
 (Toronto, ON)

July 1 – 11

Bell Payphone Labs: PL1999 and GMBLL. Payphone intervention workshops.

And And Collective
(Waterloo, ON)

July 3 – 11

The Amalgamated City of W: Imagined merging of Windsor and Waterloo through campaign office meetings, consultations and presentations.

Lee Rodney
(Windsor, ON)

July 5 – 8

Border Bookmobile: A reading station.

Emily Colombo
(Sault Ste. Marie, ON)

July 5 – 10

Multiple public Interventions based on analysis of debt-accumulation, poverty, city-beautification, and community engagement.

This project is generously supported by the City of Windsor: Cultural Affairs Office, Arts Council Windsor & Region, Windsor Pride, and the Ontario Arts Council.

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Open Engagement, Group Work: The Collective Impetus

Danielle and I will head to Portland State University this weekend to participate in Open Engagement, the conference that asks questions like, “Does socially engaged art have a responsibility to create public good? Can there be transdisciplinary approaches to contemporary art making that would contribute to issues such as urban planning and sustainability?”

We’ll be speaking on the panel, Group Work: The Collective Impetus, along with folks from National Bitter Melon Council, InCUBATE, and students from OTIS’s Public Practice program.

This trip is going to incredible for a few reasons (including getting to see the city of Portland, in all of it’s functionality), but perhaps more importantly, we’re going to be able to speak to a lot of people who are engaged in a practice that is at least slightly aligned to what we do here in BCL. It’s more often the case that we go to a conference as some of the only artists in attendance (an interesting position to be in, but always a little lonely).

There’s so many conversations we want to have, the 3 days we’re actually there likely won’t be enough.

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How to Save a City

The details: Friday, May 21 at 7pm, Art Gallery of Windsor.

For the past five months, we’ve been working on a series of events aimed at unfolding the stories, experiences, images, geography, buildings, folkloric histories, people, and places that make Windsor the city that it is. Perhaps you’ve come out to one of our community events in the Broken City Lab: Save the City series, or perhaps you’ve just read about it here, or maybe you’ve meant to come, but you haven’t been able to fit it into your schedule — in an case, this is going to be our final event as part of the project, and you should come.

The things that we’ve learned from working with the community on creating audio documentaries, city-wide maps, sidewalk-parades, and postcards with hand-written letters have changed the way we think about this city, its past, and its future.

So, we would like to cordially invite you to the final part of Save the City on May 21st at the Art Gallery of Windsor. We’ll be in or around the building depending on the weather, but either way, we promise we won’t be hard to find. We would like you to come out to share with us one more time some of the things that shape the way you think about Windsor — we’ll talk about what we’ve learned, we’ll ask you a bunch of questions, we’ll show you hundreds of photographs, and then we’ll ask you to help us come up with a message that we’ll then put up on a billboard (or two) somewhere in Windsor. We’re hoping that this message can say something to the city that needs to be said.

Hope you can make it.

Broken City Lab: Save the City is generously supported by the Ontario Arts Council.