Art and Social Action

Art and Social Action

A discussion with Linda Hawke, Adina Edwards, Mary Swain and Lois Klassen

moderated by Dick Averns

Thursday May 21 at 6:30 pm, ConocoPhillips Theatre, Glenbow Museum / FREE

Tradition, contemporary art practice, and social action come together in two dynamic, collaborative, textile based projects—Sewing Home and Comforter Art-Action, as part of Sew City: a community project for mending and making at Glenbow Museum. Join us for discussions with the artists and lively conversation.

Linda Hawke, Adina Edwards and Mary Swain discuss their project Sewing Home, part of the City of Calgary’s year long initiative called “This Is My City,” which engages the homeless and impoverished in creative pursuits. Over the past months, Sewing Home engaged a small group of marginalized women at the Calgary Women’s Centre in creative exploration of textiles with the intent of developing practical skills, growing personal capacities and building communication across communities. The project leaders share outcomes and observations.

Vancouver artist Lois Klassen produces artworks that invite involvement and participation—with Archive City she is part of an artist group that provides the services of a memory collection agency; in a new work, Garden Gnomad, uses a solar-powered machine to document and dialogue with small-scale urban agriculturalists. Since 2001, participants of her on-going project, Comforter Art-Action, have joined her in the construction of humanitarian blankets. As artist in residence at Glenbow, Klassen will host public sewing circles and completed comforters will become part of a growing art installation in the lobby of the museum that aim to materialize Calgary’s response to homelessness. Klassen will discuss how bedding is used as a subject in contemporary artworks, especially artworks that consider social and political issues and will describe how Comforter Art-Action has worked in art contexts.

Presented in conjunction with the Canadian Social Forum 2009.

http://www.ccsd.ca/csf/2009/

Tagged as: Artist Talk, calgary art, Canadian Social Forum, discussion