Ecological Artmaking Community Project

When Toronto's Royal Conservatory of Music sent out a flyer inviting participation in a new project of its Active Ecology Program, I signed up immediately.

For several years I've been following the work of artists involved in environmental artmaking, beginning with Andy Goldsworthy's books and more recently, the documentary film of his work, Rivers and Tides.

In 1999 I took part in a workshop in Toronto with Basia Irland, the sculptor who has devoted nearly thirty years exploring waterways in various personal and community interactions. As the prologue to her new book, Water Library, states her involvement: "she makes art that plots the mysteries of water." In the Toronto workshop, organized by The Milkweed Collective , Basia led us in a ritual to honour the Don River, a process she describes in her book (p. 91) as "renewing our kinship with the river and its urban environment." She has involved many other groups and communties in to bring awareness to rivers, streams, and watersheds.

My continuing involvement with The Milkweed Collective artists and their exhibitions at the Neilson Park Community Centre in Etobicoke not only revived for me my previous work as an art teacher and gallery curator in Saskatchewan, but inspired me to explore further, beginning with Suzi Gablik's The Reenchantment of Art -- a book I consider essential reading for the future of working creatively in our rapidly changing culture. My own experiences of making art have been limited to projects with fellow Milkweed artists; extensive reading has deepened my interest.

Now the prospect of taking part in the RCM project promises to engage not only my thought processes but intensify my active involvement.

Nicole Arends, the Director of the Active Ecology Program, has arranged for three artists to work for ten weeks with 45 participants of all ages to create a large scale installation and performance art piece based around an ecological issue. The completed piece will be exhibited and performed April 20 at Earth Day Canada festivities at Downsview Park during the day and at The Royal Conservatory of Music the same evening, and again at Toronto's Green Living Show from April 25-27.

The process is intended as a pilot project for exploring and connecting with environment issues throught the arts, and through community involvement.

As well as taking part in what looks like an exciting project, I want to document how it happens. There is a wealth of information on the Green Museum web site about public participation in creating ecological art -- all of it inspiring and none of it reflecting Canadian experiences. There are web sites devoted to environmental artmaking in European countries: again, I have yet to find a site recording work relevant to Canada's environment.

The RCM project may be a valuable model for involving so many people in an urban setting on a single major project.

It seemed a worthwhile idea for me to set up a blog and invite all my fellow participants -- including the artists -- and any happenstance visitors to the site, to add their comments over the next ten weeks. I expect the project will create a lot of enthusiasm, a lot of ideas and environmental concerns, a lot of questions, and posting them as comments here would make them known to anyone checking this blog.

After each Thursday evening gathering to work on the Ecological Art Project, I will devote a post from my experience. I will also post anything I come across in my reading that might seem relevant to what we'll all be working on. Comments are invited to any posting, for everyone to see.

I'm looking forward to meeting fellow participants next Thursday night -- have no idea what we'll do, or how we'll do it; how messy or how chaotic the process will be, but do expect it might open a world of possibilities.