Calendars, Notes, Installations, Vinyl, Camouflage, Drywall, Tests, and Hearts

Our rate of posting on here has slowed down considerably since the summer. We’re still busy, it’s just the pace of the work and projects now seems to span longer and longer time frames, and with so many ongoing and overlapping projects, it’s just a lot more challenging to find the time to keep track of it all. We’re actually putting in more time than ever, with Hiba and I meeting regularly two to three days a week and our colleagues joining in when schedules allow. It’s amazingly fun and productive, but harder than ever to document meaningfully.

So, just for a quick look into the last four or five weeks, here’s what we’ve been up to…

Above, we’re planning for the 1W3KND Writing Residency, and we’ll be announcing our participating writers and artists really soon.

We’ve also been hosting biweekly events at CIVIC SPACE. Every other Monday is All Tomorrow’s Problems. We take a lot of notes.

Every other Wednesdays are Zine Nights, and then there’s Skills For Good(s) on a semi-regular Tuesday night schedule. All of these events are free and open to everyone. We usually post the details on the right-hand side column of the front page of our website, and also try to keep civicspace.info up to date. Emphasis on try.

Here are some of the leftovers from Alana Bartol’s recent Skills for Good(s) on Making a Ghillie Suit!

October also allowed us to play host to Sam Lefort returning to take on a project with students from Forster.

The project and exhibition were so great and it was incredibly fun to have Sam back for an entire month.

Here’s just a little peek at her installation.

And, the process of taking down the vinyl to make way for the upcoming Cross-Plotting, opening on Friday, November 9th!

Hiba and I have been working on some other parallel projects for an exhibition in January. Think planes and banners.

Rosina provided the new over-sized pad of paper. It’s been very helpful.

We also still have some postcards left from Sam’s show, if you’d like some.

We’ve been patching the walls, a lot. I think the winter break is going to be set aside for a painting party.

We’ve also had the pleasure of Laura Gentili as a kick-ass studio assistant. She’s assembled furniture, changed door locks, organized, scanned, and sketched her way through the last few weeks, and been awesome the entire way.

Sam was kind enough to leave our space a little nicer than she found it. Above, and installation to brighten up the back office area at CIVIC SPACE.

Also, we’re still working on our window installation, with the help of Paul Anderson. Earlier today, he was testing a contact mic, while also going over details to build the Max patch we’ll actually need.

And this afternoon, Hiba and I also picked up a project that appeared in How to Forget the Border Completely.

This is something that Danielle has been wanting to do forever. Above, a really early prototype.

We’ll eventually laser cut and etch these from aluminum. Installation to follow. Also, in the background, we’re writing. We’re still working on the Homework publication with Brennan and Cholé. And, we’re planning projects into the fall of 2013. It’s good.

Open Studio – Civic Boredom: Street Remedies

Mark your calendars for Friday, October 26th at 7pm for an open studio of our artist-in-residence, Sam Lefort. You’ll remember Sam from earlier in the summer when she hosted a rapid fire series of workshops on urban ecology at CIVIC SPACE. She’ll be presenting a new project realized over the course of her residency in collaboration with students from J.L. Forster Secondary School. You’ll have a chance to meet Sam and the students!

The project, CIVIC BOREDOM: STREET REMEDIES,  features a series of temporary street art stencils installed around the city. Working through a series of workshops with Sam, the students created powerful text-based visual statements that will get residents and visitors starting to think about issues impacting youth.

Using custom card stock stencils and environmentally friendly, hand-made chalk paint (corn starch and water), students made their marks (temporarily) around downtown Windsor to try to bring some attention to their hopes and concerns for their futures and the future of the city.

Here are just a few of the installations around the city. LESS TALKING MORE DOING.

I WISH YOU COULD SEE THE POTENTIAL.

OUR FUTURE.

THEY JUST KEEP FIGHTNIG (sic).

See you Friday!

FEAST with Sam Lefort on Friday, October 5th at 7pm

You’re invited to a FEAST this Friday, October 5th at 7pm at CIVIC SPACE hosted by our Artist-in-Residence, Sam Lefort. This free dinner event kicks off her month-long residency and her return after an incredible week of workshops earlier this summer.

The Feast Worldwide dinner party for good takes place on the final day of The Feast Conference, October 5. Pick a challenge, host a dinner, and by the end of your meal, kick-off a project to make the world better. The evening will include:

– A real-time world map of all the dinners taking place from Auckland to Dubai
– Official Challenges—Poverty Challenge presented by Mark Bezos of Robin Hood, Health Challenge presented by Arcade Fire on behalf of Partners in Health and more!
– Dedicated dinner pages to interact with other guests via Twitter
– A huge bank of resources to help make your ideas happen

Learn more at worldwide.feastongood.com

Please RSVP on Twitter @s_lefort or contact@samanthalefort.com.

Exploring Urban Ecology with Sam Lefort (a look back at our week of workshops)

It was a quick week, but such an excellent start to our Artist-in-Residence program at CIVIC SPACE. Sam Lefort, bee lover, excellent designer, and most generous workshop host spent the week teaching members of the Windsor-Essex (and beyond) community about a range of sustainably minded practices and interventions, hopefully many of which will be carried on in numerous locations around the region.

We’re already looking forward to bringing Sam back, but in the meantime, here’s a look at the week (and possibly what you missed!)…

Continue reading “Exploring Urban Ecology with Sam Lefort (a look back at our week of workshops)”

Setting Up for the Urban Ecology Workshops

Today, we’re pleased to kick off the first workshop from our first artist-in-residence at CIVIC SPACE! Samantha Lefort will host a series of workshops this week on Urban Ecology — starting today at 3pm with Urban Apiaries (BEES AND YOU, IN THE URBAN LANDSCAPE).

Need to know more? Check out more info on Windsor’s CBC Radio’s The Bridge in an interview with Sam!

Sam and Hiba spent the bulk of Monday preparing the space and materials for the workshops.

Some prep for the window installation and urban container gardening workshop.

Box of supplies!

We also put up some signage in the window … translating Sam’s banner graphic into a vinyl cut.

Justin and Sam at work.

Can’t wait to see all of this come together.

Sam’s to-do list on some ledger sheets she found in an attic in Philadelphia.

Bundles of bamboo.

Hiba prepping the vinyl transfer tape.

The cut turned out well — and white looks great on the windows.

I think we’ll be changing our other graphics to white as well.

Free workshops all week on making our city a more livable place! Check out the details here:
http://civicspace.info/programming/urban-ecology-workshops/

Also, we’re still looking for some moss for Thursday night’s workshop– anyone have any leads?