A Week in the Studio: Some Documentation and Reflections on Last Week at CIVIC SPACE
While we prepare for the launch of CIVIC SPACE on June 21st with the Letter Library project, we’re also settling into a routine of being in the space at 411 Pelissier. The idea of having a space of our own is really new to us. Four years after starting BCL by meeting in the classrooms [...]
![Michelle Wybenga is asking people for love letters to Windsor. As part of her ongoing micro-residency, she’s requesting from a number of people that she knows in the city for a contribution to an eventual publication of sorts containing these letters among many others. She spent the weekend at BCL HQ working towards the beginnings [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/Juniper-Books-150x150.jpg "Michelle Wybenga’s Micro-Residency: Love Letters to the City")
![Josh and I spent some of the day in the heat collecting some interesting flowers and plants to transplant for our magnetic planters project. Overall, it was fairly successful, as we did learn quite a lot about transplanting, but we’re still going to be looking for some more plants to finish up this stage of [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/IMG_46142-150x150.jpg "Learning to Transplant")
![I spent the better part of the day on Saturday doing some more basic research into connecting an Arduino and LCD for this ongoing project. For the most part, it’s pretty basic and following the wiring diagrams and tutorials online is fine. I ran into a problem with getting text on two lines, which I’ll [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/IMG_6480-150x150.jpg "Getting Things to Talk: Arduino + LCDs")
![Day two of Create Here‘s City Share Conference was just as busy as the first, but we got tons of work accomplished, and we were even able to take a short tour of the city at lunch! After breakfast, we broke off into our groups once again. We were still trying to come up with [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/IMG_0531-150x150.jpg "Day Two of the City Share Conference in Chattanooga, TN!")
![Last night Hiba, Danielle and I met to do some more prep work on the letters for the Letter Library launch on June 21st. We painted another test letter E a different shade of grey and started to populate a wall with some more of the tests. It was excellent to see more than a [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/IMG_96051-150x150.jpg "Nothing like being thorough: how we make decisions, slowly")
![The weekend brought all of the artists together to collaborate on each other’s projects. The Imagination Lab engaged lots of young creative minds, and Thom Provost began work on his installation. Imagination Lab had open workshops for kids today. The amazing array of supplies and ingredients made for a fun and yummy smelling time in [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/DSC_07201-150x150.jpg "SRSI, Day 16 & 17 : Collaboration")
![We spent last night watching a rough cut of some of Eric’s ongoing micro-residency project, did a lot of measuring, used Google Earth, did some math, drew some diagrams, and brainstormed a new project (because Cristina wants to sew, a lot). With the semester basically over now, we’re hoping to wrap up a couple things [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/IMG_6230-150x150.jpg "Math, Markers, and Measurements + Eric’s micro-documentary")
![With almost a full crew we spent this Friday night testing finishes, planning ways to cross the border unnoticed, and building supports for the letter ‘R’, all while being filmed by a documentary crew from the Department of Communications, Media & Film. Above, some notes from Danielle’s sprawling research on inventions for tactically crossing a [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/IMG_91951-150x150.jpg "BCL Report: March 25, 2011 (Imaginary Portals & Ongoing Construction)")
![Save the Date: June 21st, 2012 at 7pm CIVIC SPACE (411 Pelissier St, downtown Windsor) On June 21st at 7pm, we’ll be kicking things CIVIC SPACE with the Letter Library (A Collection of Alphabetic Interventions). This open community project invites anyone and everyone to come borrow from our letterset to caption the city around them. With Windsor at [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/LetterLibraryProject-150x150.jpg "Project Launch June 21st: The Letter Library (A Collection of Alphabetic Interventions)")
![Monday saw the last new residents move in to the SRSI spaces; Lee Rodney’s Bookmobile Reading Room and Emily Colombo’s friendly services. To get footage for the SRSI documentary, Daragh followed Norman around, who was on his A game all day. Norman’s logs present a personal perspective on his security guard experiences. Lee Rodney arrived [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/IMG_1470-150x150.jpg "SRSI, Day 25: Bookmobile & Friendly Services")
![Over three days this week, we got a lot done. And, as I write this, stuff is still getting done. This is why collaboration is such a valuable model for art practice. But, it’s not just about getting stuff done, it’s the challenges, the insights, the novel perspectives that can be brought up around a [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/IMG_9628-150x150.jpg "BCL Report: End of April, 2011 (the Art of Planning & Collaboration)")
![I’m not sure why we didn’t start doing this earlier, but here’s the first report of our weekly activities. We’ve been meeting on Fridays for almost half the summer, trying to make, plan, and do events/projects/demos/awesome. Today involved us revisiting our seed bomb recipe, beginning the stenciling for posters for our upcoming Dance Party (details [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/Broken-City-Lab-Friday-August-22-2008-Stenciling-%2B-seed-bombs-150x150.jpg "BCL Report – August 22, 2008")
![I stopped by the Ecohouse today (where our collective studio is housed) to check out one of our new neighbours — The Border Bookmobile Winter Reading Room. Collected and curated by Border Bookmobile founder, Lee Rodney, the books assembled as part of the winter reading room are going to be incredible helpful for our upcoming [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/IMG_5136-150x150.jpg "Anxious to Explore the Border Bookmobile’s Winter Reading Room")
![Monday night we spent a couple hours working over some new ideas with some new friends. Mostly, these ideas have been in the “meaning to do that” category, mostly opening up new collaborations in which new projects will unfold. Two main project frameworks came out of our brainstorm session—a floating sculpture project with the Green [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/IMG_5402-150x150.jpg "New Project Mondays: Week 1")
![It was a bit of a quiet Sunday, but things were still happening down at SRSI. In particular, Julie and Jefferson were hard at work all day, preparing their project, “The Peoples Museum & Fabulations de Windsor.” Above, and in between visits from some neighbours and friends, Julie preps a large piece of paper for [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/IMG_9890-150x150.jpg "SRSI, Day 3: Quiet Sunday, but things were still happening")
![Mondays always seem to be the best studio days. Maybe it’s because the weight of the week hasn’t set in, or that the last Thursday is just far enough away that we’re motivated to try to get more work done. Whatever it is, yesterday was a particularly good example of getting things done at CIVIC [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/wpid20679-IMG_3069-150x150.jpg "Monday in the Studio: Rubber, Plaques, T-shirts")
![Last Wednesday, Justin, Michelle, Josh and I flew from Detroit, MI to Atlanta, GA and drove another two hours to Chattanooga, TN for the City Share conference put on by our friends from Create Here! Veronique picked us up from the the airport in Atlanta. We grabbed a bit of food and then headed straight [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/IMG_3050-150x150.jpg "Our Arrival to Chattanooga, TN and Day One of the City Share Conference!")
![Half a year’s worth of papers that haven’t yet been filed makes me excited to think about everything we did this year and what we’ll do over the next twelve months. Also, we need to figure out when we can meet in the new year. Are Friday nights still any good for anyone? Happy New [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/IMG_5126-150x150.jpg "Happy New Year. More Ahead!")
![Another Friday night open house gave the SRSI participants a great opportunity to show projections and engage in discussions about their experiences and feelings about working in Windsor. Denise St. Marie came down from Toronto to install her work Talk 2 Strangers. The piece is made from cut vinyl on easy to transport plastic sheeting [...]](http://d1ugx41kvdwavn.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/DSC_06824-150x150.jpg "SRSI, Day 15: Evening Projections & Conversations")