Activating Pigeon Park: A Community Curation Project of Roots and Resilience
August 12, 19, & 26
August 12: Plant Pot Painting
Decorate a provided plant pot. We’ll fill the pots with soil and plant seeds together. You can nurture your plant at home or place it in the nearby K’emk’emlay Healing Garden.
August 19: Community Super 8 Film with Hives4Humanity
Artists Sarah & Cait of Hives4Humanity will lead a workshop that engages all your senses: sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell. Together, we’ll create a community Super 8 film through a series of interactive and sensory activities.
August 26: Chalkboard Mural, Word Garden & Bannock
Help create a chalkboard mural with Priscillia Mays Tait, take part in community poetry creation with Dag Davidge at the word garden, and eat fresh bannock made by Wayne Belong.
Workshops are from 11am-1pm. Full details below!
Activating Pigeon Park is a community curation project that is rooted in the composite history of Pigeon Park. A month of art workshops will invite the community to interact with Pigeon Park’s history and foster imaginings of new stories through mixed media pathways. Workshops will be engaged with the park's outstanding history of restraining access to green spaces, hostile architecture, and the perennial colonial powers of the CPR Railway tracks which cut through the heart of Pigeon Park. The project questions urban planning: How can citizens interrogate who the city is for through taking up space with our bodies and manipulating environments?
Originally named Pioneer Place, the plot of land which once gave way to the CPR Railway, was deeded to the city in 1939 to become a “public beauty spot and place for rest” for itinerant workers, to shift about the various gigs offered by employment agencies in the area. By 1960, the park's hospitable intentions depleted along with the small green space the park was allocated. As 1960 Park Board Superintendent Phil Stroyan puts it, the triangle park is a “place of physical, horticulture and biological impossibility”. The patch of grass was blocked by obstructive fencing and in doing so, aimed to dissuade the public from using the space. Instead, Pigeons took their spot and gleaned the feeble patch of grass as the public watched from behind the fence. Thereby earning the locally known name as, ‘Pigeon Park’. Despite this push back, Pigeon Park has persisted as a gathering place for the community to this day.
Art workshops will be attuned to discovering alternative pathways for cultivating green spaces through the framework of an open family & friends style event. A kickstarting event will be a Paint-Your-Own-Pot workshop, which will engage participants in horticulture through the framework of nurturing new stories and histories. Each participant will be given tools to decorate their pots and fill it with dirt and a plant starter of their choosing. Each plant and pot are welcomed to a place within The Healing Garden at 117E Hastings, where participants are encouraged to visit the open garden on Wednesdays 10-12pm. Later, Hives4Humanity will lead a sensory workshop that culminates into a community Super 8 film. The group will be led through sensory activation exercises that focus on deep listening and curious looking before having an open play session including; Super 8 filming, sound recording and hand animations on clear Super 8 film leader. The final film will be eco-processed using tobacco and fireweed plants in The Healing Garden and later exhibited on Gachets Community Art Screen.
For our closing event, a local artist will be invited to draw a mural design on a chalkboard wall which will be placed in the park and encourage the public to add their own colour to the piece. The finished design will be exhibited in the Annual Oppenheimer Park Community Art Show scheduled for October. Additionally, a Word Garden made out of handmade paper infused with seeds, will allow participants to move around words to create their own community poem. There will be a bannock barbeque, with food, drinks and music to accompany the afternoon. As an assemblage of events, Activating Pigeon Park strives to push beyond imaginings of green futures by cultivating opportunities for the roots of our community to learn and grow together as activated artists, activists, curators and friends.
Sophia Santos-English
Gallery Associate/ Curatorial Assistant
Paint Your Own Pot Event - Aug 12, 11-1pm
To kick start the event, we will begin the month with a paint your own pot event. Participants will receive their own plant pot and will be given the supplies to decorate as they see fit. We will fill the pots with dirt and plant seeds together.
Participants are encouraged to tend to their plant and or, are guided towards the K’emk’emlay Healing Garden where there will be a reserved spot for the plants to exist. With the ability to visit every Wednesday 10-12 pm and participate in Hives4Humanity workshops.
Hives4Humanity- Community Super 8 Film & Eco-Processing - Aug 19, 11-1pm
In partnership with Hives4Humanity, artists Sarah & Cait will lead a sensory workshop encouraging participants to activate their senses: sight, sound, touch, taste & smell. A culmination of this will be an embodied creation of a community Super 8 film.
Workshop will begin with an opening circle that will center participants on welcoming a sensory body experience and invite setting intentions. Additionally, it will go over a deep listening and curious eyes exercise.
Spread over 3 tables; there will be open camera and sound play time along with an unspooled clear super 8 leader where participants can draw, glue, and paste experimental animations on. Participants are also encouraged to play with the available tobacco and fireweed plants, to make sensorial associations with how film will eventually be eco-processed.
Later August 28th, there will be an open workshop in the garden, where the film will be eco-processed with tobacco and fireweed.
Finalized film will be displayed on Gallery Gachets Community Art Screen.
Public Art: Chalkboard Mural, Word Garden & Bannock- Aug 26, 11-1pm
Partnering with Priscillia Mays Tait to create an outline on a chalkboard wall responding to the Pigeon Park Event. The public will be invited to colour and draw on the chalkboard. The progression of the piece can be documented as a timelapse video and screened through our community video screen in the gallery.
A word garden will be facilitated by local artist and poet Dag Davidge. The word garden will consist of individually cut out pieces of handmade seed paper with one word written on it. There will also be blank leaflets, with materials to add your own words to the mix. Participants are encouraged to create a poem, phrase, or feeling using the words. The poem will be rearranged throughout the day, as people can build off another's poem or borrow a word etc. At the end of the day people are free to take a word with them and plant it.
Lastly, fresh bannock will be provided by Wayne Belong, which will be shared amongst some snacks, drinks and toppings. Hives4Humanity will help in providing a fresh honey tastings.
