Desire and the City: A Citizen’s Abandoned-Lot Design Consultancy (Sept. 7th & 14th at Civic Space)

Desire and the City

DESIRE AND THE CITY: A Citizen’s Abandoned-Lot Design Consultancy Led by Kiki Athanassiadis (Register Now!)

September 7th & September 14th, 2013 from 1-4pm – CIVIC Space (411 Pelissier Street, Windsor, Ontario) 

Led by recent transplant and guest artist Kiki Athanassiadis, this is Part One of a citizen’s design workshop to imagine, design, build and deploy a non-permanent design solution for an empty lot near you.

Is there an empty lot that’s close to your heart? One that you think is great as is or, conversely, think could be put to much better use?

The aim of this 2-day design consultancy, where you become both client and designer, is to help you articulate via playful means, your desire for civic improvement.

For two Saturday afternoons in September, CIVIC Space will be transformed into your local pop-up design studio & consultancy. We will visit local empty lots, collect data and play with paper & reproductions of the sites and various design elements that each designer can assemble into their civic enhancement solutions.

Day 1: We concentrate on sites around Civic Space.

Day 2: Participants work on sites of specific interest to them – maybe ones located in their own neighbourhood!

This workshop is open to all! No design experience necessary. Please bring your camera if you have one.

For more information, please contact Kiki Athanassiadis here.

Please Register Below:


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New Publication Out Now: Invented Emergency (For Small Cities & Big Towns)

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We just received a few boxes of our newest publication, INVENTED EMERGENCY (For Small Cities & Big Towns), published through White Water Gallery. They look so good, we can’t wait to give them out!

INVENTED EMERGENCY is built on the research developed for Surviving North Bay, a residency and exhibition by Broken City Lab, hosted by White Water Gallery in the summer and fall of 2012. Surviving North Bay developed as a series of exploratory public interventions, micro-gestures, and tactical responses to North Bay. Each of these exploratory initiatives called on public participation to engage with North Bay, its infrastructures, and its communities. Throughout the residency, we collected research on the city in support of an exhibition that aimed to not only examine the practice and production of a northern locality, but also present a range of resistive tactics that can help the community survive, or help one survive the community. Emergencies became shorthand for this series of resistive tactics and gestures and INVENTED EMERGENCY extends these ideas towards developing a series of starting points and positions for new (and revisited) radical practices.

Pick up your copy at CIVIC SPACE, or let us know if you want one, and I’m sure we can arrange getting one in the mail to you!

Huge thanks to Clayton and Robyn and everyone at White Water Gallery for making this possible!

This project was generously supported by the Ontario Arts Council.

Nicole Lavelle & Sarah Baugh Discuss Their Plans at Civic Space

Late last week, two Portland artists–Nicole Lavelle & Sarah Baugh–arrived at CIVIC SPACE in a brown Volkswagen Westfalia camper van to spend a couple weeks exploring Windsor and eventually designing a Windsor Tour Guide publication. They took a few minutes yesterday evening to ask each other questions about what their collaborative project at CIVIC SPACE will entail.

Stay tuned for more announcements about their publication launch, happening April 18th at CIVIC SPACE.

Windsor is Forever Tattoo Day: Seventh Batch Completed

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The seventh batch of appointments for Windsor is Forever, a collaborative project with Jason Sturgill, have been finished. Here are the results: three Windsor tattoos by Dave KantSteve Jones, and Jon Jimenez.

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Dave Kant is on a roll with tattooing the crisp, black “W”. This guy had it done on the deltoid.

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Another recurring design choice, the Windsor rose / Bridge design is being tattooed on a forearm.

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Jon Jimenez pulls off another well-toned Windsor rose.

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This Windsor “W” is being done on a participant’s calf.

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Here it is, a completed Windsor “W”, nice and bold. Tattoo by Dave Kant. 

Windsor is Forever Tattoo Day: Sixth Batch Completed

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The sixth batch of appointments for Windsor is Forever, a collaborative project with Jason Sturgill, have been finished. Here are the results: three Windsor tattoos by Dave KantSteve Jones, and Jon Jimenez.

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Zeke shows off his two inner-elbow tattoos. Tattoos by Steve Jones.

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This participant got a Windsor / Detroit “W” on a very sensitive area near the inner elbow.

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Here is another fine iteration of the “W” by Steve Jones.

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Here is another crisp rose design underway.

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This finished Windsor rose has been intensified with tonal work. Tattoo by Steve Jones.

Windsor is Forever Tattoo Day: Fifth Batch Completed

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The fifth batch of appointments for Windsor is Forever, a collaborative project with Jason Sturgill, have been finished. Here are the results: three Windsor tattoos by Dave KantSteve Jones, and Jon Jimenez.

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Somebody finally got the Ford Model A design that Hiba designed. Tattoo by Dave Kant.

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This participant submitted a “W” pulled from a classic car named the Chrylser “Windsor”.

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The tattoo didn’t take long, but it looks fantastic. Tattoo by Steve Jones.

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Here’s another inner arm tattoo…it’s a popular spot today! This guy is getting a Windsor seal.

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Here is the finished Windsor seal. This time Jon Jimenez took it on.

Windsor is Forever Tattoo Day: First Batch Completed

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The first three appointments for Windsor is Forever, a collaborative project with Jason Sturgill, have been finished. Here are the results: three fine tattoos by Dave Kant, Steve Jones, and Jon Jimenez.

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The first appointment was a simplified Windsor seal completed by Dave Kant.

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Process shot of the second appointment, a mayfly done on a participant’s ankle.

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Here is the first iteration of the mayfly tattoo design, done by Jon Jimenez.

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Process shot of the Sandwich Town Windmill Design.

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Here is the completed Sandwich Town design done by Steve Jones. Please stay tuned for more updates from the day.

All Tomorrow’s Problems: Winter/Spring 2013

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All Tomorrow’s Problems: the Weekly Design Night for Future-Focused People

We’re hosting another round of All Tomorrow’s Problems (ATP), a weekly Design Night focused on creative and speculative problem solving.We’re going to kick things off by picking up where we left off in 2012, working through the future of local transit and mobility issues, and then moving onto other expansive and localized future-focused issues.ATP focuses on collaborative, Windsor-focused problem solving and project making, informed by weekly discussion and design nights. We’re looking for collaborative critical thinkers, problem solvers, and action-takers with an eye on the future of this city.

BCL’s Visiting Researchers/Designers Dan McCafferty and Veronica Samek will guide a 1–1.5-hour open studio every Monday, which will involve discussions, walks, field trips, rapid prototyping and wrap up with an exhibition, installation or beautiful intervention in the summer of 2013.

Plan to bring the following:

  • sketchbook, camera, laptop, and drawing tools
  • an open mind and willingness to have some productive and some open-ended conversations
  • an appreciation that this isn’t about problem-solving so much as an exercise in utopian-minded praxis

The dates to mark in your calendars:

  • Mondays in March: 4th, 11th, 18th, 25th at 7:00pm-9pm
  • Mondays in April: 1st, 8th, 15th, 22nd at 7:00pm-9pm

Didn’t this already happen?
Yes, it did. We had a great response and many inspiring ideas were developed during the first iteration of ATP, from September 2012–December 2012. The Second / Spring installment (February–April 2013) will be focused on turning all that thinking and inspiration into action and tangible projects. We will focus on making things happen and projects that address our concerns.

You know that the name of this is really similar to All Tomorrow’s Parties, right?
Yes, absolutely. We appreciate the tone of that event and thought it was a nice way to reference doing things at a different scale.

Do I have to be prepared to make art or design anything?
Think of this as a very loosely organized place to discuss and exercise your ideas on a specific topic. We may not actually make something every night, but we will aim to creatively respond to the issue at hand. Ultimately, our thinking and discussions will materialize into something.

Do I have to commit to attending every design night?
We understand schedules change, so you are free to participate as your schedule allows. But YES… plan to attend as much as possible. Let’s make stuff happen. We need you at the table!

Who are these people anyways?
Long-time Windsor-Essex resident, Veronica Samek, first began her career journey unknowingly overseas. After graduating from the University of Windsor, she worked in England where she uncovered a passion for telling the Windsor-Essex story.  Shortly thereafter, she returned to studying Journalism Print & New Media at St. Clair College and began helping others find their career paths as the Director of Communications for Workforce WindsorEssex. Through her work with this organization, Veronica is committed to a holistic approach to workforce development, emphasizing the importance of living, working and playing in a region with deep roots and a transformative pallet.  Veronica is a member of the United Way GenNext Committee and a founding member of the Awesome Windsor-Essex Foundation.

New to the Windsor area, Dan McCafferty identifies as a Winnipeger, though he has also called Ottawa, Halifax, Toronto, Chicago and Raleigh, “home.” Dan is a multi-disciplinary designer, artist and researcher who teaches Design in the Art and Art History Department at Wayne State University, in Detroit. He co-founded the critical design collective Public Design Unit in 2011 and their first project, Parkdale Versions, was installed at Toronto’s Nuit Blanche. His interests include relational, critical and speculative art and design practices which are participatory, socially engaged and community oriented.