Hello. We're artists working through collaborative social practice and creative research to understand the ways in which locality is shaped and enacted in the city.

Not exhaustive, nor complete, this map is a work-in-progress, documenting a community in-transition. For one afternoon in February 2010, we gathered together with a group of community members to create two distinct lists: Sites of Apology and Sites of Hope.

The locations identified as part of these two lists were noted as being places for which we, as a community, might need to apologize to future generations, or places for which we might hold some particular hope of their role in creating a better city for future generations.

Over the following weeks and months, we gradually visited every site on the list to (un)officially recognize it, demarcating it with a large ribbon and saying a few words about its designation. We encourage you to make your own visit to these sites.

Thank you to everyone who contributed to the list and had such an incredible and engaged conversation with us that day. This map is long overdue, but we hope it was worth the wait.

You can download the Sites of Apology / Sites of Hope Map (11″x17″).

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The details: Sunday, February 28, 2010 (1pm) at 362 California Ave, Windsor

As part of the Broken City Lab: Save the City project, and to better understand the city and its rich and failed history, Broken City Lab researchers will host an open community event on Sunday, February 28, 2010 at 1pm to map and invent two distinct community tours—Sites of Apology and Sites of Hope.

Throughout the first part of the event, Broken City Lab will lead community participants in brainstorming the numerous sites deemed to be worthy of apology—these could include failed strip malls, roads without sidewalks, or former auto factories—along with the numerous sites that give community participants hope for the city—these could include an especially great bike trail, sites of architectural significance, or places that can be imagined as being easily improved.

Immediately following the creation of these lists, Broken City Lab will set out to demarcate and officially designate each Site of Apology and Site of Hope. At each site, a short ceremony will be held and community members are welcomed to come along to help recognize each and every site.

A map demarcating each of the designated Sites of Apology and Sites of Hope will be made available online to encourage the ongoing investigation of these sites by community members.

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

Consider this required reading: over at Spacing.ca, Shawn Micallef wrote about one his more recent trips to his former hometown, Windsor. Driving down Walker Road again after spending much of his time in Toronto walking, a lot, made him realize just how staggeringly huge these auto plants are, and he questions what we’re all wondering—what will happen when these plants entirely shut down?

Go, read it.

Thanks for passing this along, Rod.

Maya Lin has created a number of public art works, memorials, and has increasingly shifted her practice towards studies of landscape, often rendering rivers, geographic relief, and water lines. Interestingly, many of her recent works are made exclusively of reclaimed materials—silver from jewelry, computers, and photographic process, and lumber from sustainably harvested wood.

There’s an interesting, but lengthy, video lecture by Maya Lin on the De Young Gallery website, where she explains a lot of her work and the processes behind it. 

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