CLICK HERE to download the full 6-page edition of The Loop Fall/Winter 2006 in pdf format
New Chair, Sarmite Bulte Takes the Helm of the Artscape Foundation
Sam Bulte is known for her passionate desire to make a difference. The Artscape Foundation encountered Sam Bulte at a time when she was looking for new challenges in life and since crossing paths, Sam has taken over the chair of the Foundation Board with gusto.
The Honourable Sarmite D. Bulte was elected to the House of Commons three times and has been a champion for Canadian women, women entrepreneurs and the culture and heritage sector. She has been recognized for this with almost every “woman-of-distinction” award under the sun. She has sat on or chaired almost every committee, caucus and task force created to support women, the arts, trade and entrepreneurship in Canada.
In the midst of her involvement on committees, trade missions, reports, summits and commonwealth parliamentary associations, she has found the time to be a benefactor and supporter of arts, culture, social services and health care organizations. As well, she has raised three wonderful children with her husband, Steven. In 1980, Sam started her own successful full-service Bay Street law firm that ran until 1997, at which time she successfully entered politics. Sam’s areas of legal expertise are real estate, commercial and corporate law. However, she has also earned a BA in English and her love of culture and the arts has never faded.
Since Sam left the world of politics, she has been courted by countless non-profit boards and committees for her support. The Artscape Foundation has been one of the lucky organizations to have acquired her as a board member. Sam’s busy schedule has not held her back from taking over the position of Board Chair and the Chair of the Green Arts Barns Campaign Cabinet. She has been pulling out all the stops for the Artscape Foundation and providing inspirational leadership. We are fortunate to have her at the helm.
Animating the Green Arts Barns
For months, Artscape has been actively fundraising to transform the former Wychwood TTC Streetcar Barns into the Green Arts Barns. This historic Toronto landmark will soon become the new home for many artists, their families and 13 not-forprofit arts and environmental organizations.
Community members will be welcomed to share in the extensive community space where culturally and environmentally rich educational experiences will continually animate the Green Arts Barns and the surrounding park area. Two of the many organizations that will animate the Green Arts Barns are The Stop
Community Food Centre and Theatre Direct.
Urban Agriculture with The Stop
The Stop will bring ground - breaking urban agriculture programming to the Green Arts Barns with a sustainable food systems education centre located in the Green Barn that teaches people how to produce healthy, local food by involving them in the process. Everyone from children to seniors can learn how to grow organic food in their neighbourhood while hearing about good food policies with examples from across the city and around the world.
The year-round greenhouse and sheltered gardens will make it possible to stretch our idea of what we can grow locally, from growing greens and herbs in the winter to extending the season for tender fruits and vegetables in protected outdoor beds. This means the participants will see an increase in the fresh produce provided in the Stop’s food programs. Neighbours will be able to cook and
enjoy food together in a social environment with community kitchens and an outdoor wood-burning bake oven. With its balance of social justice, healthy food production and innovation, the Green Barn will be a powerful magnet that attracts a diversity of people working together on solutions to hunger and poverty – rather like The Stop itself!
Unlike many of our seeds, this exciting project will not grow on its own. If you wish to support The Stop programs and services please go to www. canadahelps.org or contact Nadien at nadien@thestop.org 416-652-7867 ext. 224.
Award Winning Theatre for Youth
The award winning Theatre Direct is known for its commitment to the values of access, artistic excellence and collaboration with communities. Theatre Direct’s new home in the Community Barn will offer an exciting program of performances and arts education activities for young people – including the children and youth that occupy the many schools and organizations surrounding the Green Arts Barns. The flexible new studio theatre space will be designed with young people in mind, accommodating between 50-100 people for performances and workshops.
The proximity of the space to so many schools will enable Theatre Direct to become a theatre and arts education destination for young people and inspire meaningful creative partnerships with local schools. This is an important part of the Theatre Direct programming and will culminate in presentations for the community. In addition, the new studio will facilitate the development of programming such as: drama in education; professional development workshops; parent and toddler storytelling evenings; family events; after-school youth theatre programs; holiday theatre camps; summer camps for children and weekend
classes. Theatre Direct will also provide space to other performing arts organizations with programs that are aimed at children and youth.
If you wish to support Theatre Direct with a donation, please go to www.canadahelps.org or contact them at info@theatredirect.on.ca or 416-537-4191.
Remix: Get Money, Make Change
In July of 2005, the ‘summer of the gun’ was coming to an end in Toronto and Mayor David Miller was driving back to City Hall from a meeting of the Mayor’s Community Safety Panel. Along for the ride was young Kehinde Bah, a youth leader on the Mayor’s Panel.
Bah had a vision for a life skills training program for at-risk youth that would employ hip hop and urban culture to engage young people. The project was named Remix. During the car ride, Bah was trying to impress upon Miller the fact that great programs need appropriate space and that Remix could only be delivered in a space that could enable such a complex program. “Why don’t you call Artscape?”
Mayor Miller suggested.
This is how the partnership between Remix and Artscape began. According to Bah, “we were skeptical about meeting with Artscape and whether or not they would get the whole hip hop thing, but it was only after we met that we started to believe that this was not a pipe dream.” According to Bah, Artscape made the project real.
The partnership with Remix was a natural fit for Artscape. Artscape understands that Toronto’s diversity necessitates expanding our view of culture. As a part of the organization’s recent strategic planning process, increased access for emerging creators that represent Toronto’s diversity was identified as a key priority.
Kehinde Bah also connected with Gavin Sheppard and Derek Jankar (aka Drex Inkredible) from I.C. Visions. I.C. Visions is a youth-led, hip hop based drop-in program run in Etobicoke with the support of LAMP Community Health Centre.
For six years, I.C. Visions has been providing programs such as skill building, mentoring,,career development and entrepreneurship to,at-risk youth from across the city.
A collaboration between Drex, Gavin and Kehinde led to the Remix Project. “Remix is dedicated to all those youth out there that had dreams of what they wanted to be when they grew up, only to see those dreams given up because of the barriers in their lives” says Bah.
Artscape has provided many hours of support in the form of finding properties, negotiating leases, planning, designing and managing the development of the space.
Above and beyond these services, the Artscape Foundation dedicated its staffing
resources to bringing in donors and in-kind supporters to develop the space and fully furnish a number of rooms including two resource rooms. These contributions, primarily through Verdiroc Development Corporation, will amount to well in excess of $60,000 in donated goods and services.
“Remix works,” says Gavin Sheppard, Project Coordinator, “because we are working at the root of the criminal problem . . . the reality of the situation on the streets is that young men and women would rather be criminals than burger flippers. They would rather be entrepreneurs or work in an organization that advances them. We understand it because we live it. Young people in the GTA do not lack talent, drive, intelligence or ideas. What the young people in this city need are outlets, support and resources.”
The Remix Project officially launched on October 2, 2006 at 110 Sudbury Street in the West Queen West community and has been growing strong ever since. Remix is providing three streams of programming to 120 youth per year from the city’s high priority neighbourhoods. Whether they are in the media arts stream and dream of becoming a recording artist, recording engineer or music video director; the creative arts stream and dream of becoming a writer, journalist, graphic designer, photographer; or the art of business stream and dream of becoming an entrepreneur, a marketing manager or fashion mogul, the Remix Project is dedicated to helping young people get closer to their
dreams and putting their best foot forward.
This is done through an innovative 6-month curriculum that marries the young person’s personal plans and aspirations with mandatory workshops around the basics of the business and project management. Visit http://theremixproject.ca/
Artscape Programs & Services Update
15 visual artists aged 16-21 were selected for the 2006 Young Artist Showcase, a feature event of Artscape’s annual Queen West Art Crawl. At an opening night exhibition at the Gladstone Hotel, Danielle De Paulos took home the Young Artist Award for her piece from her Golden Years series.
Artscape hosts the Creative Hub Development Workshop Nov. 22-24, 2006 in Ottawa. Participants will be provided with in-depth instruction, hands-on training and practical tools focused on each of the critical phases of development planning and project implementation for multi-tenant centres.
On Feb. 22, 2007, an exciting culinary fundraiser will be held to raise money towards the development of the Green Arts Barns. Organized by local community members, it will feature a local organic food menu created by neighbourhood restaurants and chefs along with the work of artisans in a live auction.
The 2007 Gibraltar Point International Artist Residency Program will take place Jun. 1–30 at Artscape’s Gibraltar Point Centre for the Arts facility on Toronto Island. The program is open to Canadian and international artists working in all disciplines who are engaged in the research, development or creation of work.
In The Development Pipeline
As Canada’s leading practitioner in non-profit creative space development, Artscape has transformed over 230,000ft2 of underutilized buildings into dynamic community assets – each providing a catalyst for more comprehensive urban regeneration. Artscape’s growing consulting practice integrates this on-theground expertise with pioneering research and international collaborations to create a unique blend of knowledge and experience focused on nurturing and sustaining creative activity within innovative buildings and cultural districts.
Creative Clustering in Ontario
Recent consulting work has been focused primarily in Ontario, including development of a business plan for transforming a historic distillery on Kingston’s waterfront into a cultural learning hub, undertaking a feasibility study for the expansion of the Arts Court in Ottawa, assessment of the creative clustering potential in Kitchener’s downtown and investigation of development opportunities for London’s downtown and Old East Village districts.
The Guild Cultural Precinct – A 21st Century Vision
The Guild Inn is a publicly owned, 88-acre property on the Scarborough Bluffs with a remarkable history as a Canadian arts and crafts colony. Goldsmith, Borgal & Company Ltd. Architects, in conjunction with Artscape, the MBTW Group and Novita were retained by the City of Toronto to explore the feasibility, design and development model for a new cultural precinct on the site. The study was recently completed and proposes a sculpture park, artisan studios, a craft shop, a multi-purpose space, galleries and a Visitor Centre, re-establishing the site as a centre for the arts in Canada.
Assessing the Future of Givins/Shaw School
Built at the turn of the 20th century, this beautiful old school building was declared surplus by the Toronto District School Board six years ago. Last year, Artscape was approached by members of the school community and the TDSB to undertake a feasibility study as a first step to chart its adaptive reuse as a vibrant cultural centre. Artscape is currently engaged in a process built on a foundation of community consultation and aimed at producing a report early in the new year. This month and next, Artscape will convene a series of focus group
meetings, stakeholder workshops and a community open house with the participation of the Givins/Shaw Parent Council, TDSB trustee and staff, major cultural partners, prospective tenants, arts service organizations, City of Toronto Culture Division, local artists and members of the community at large.
International Connections
There’s no shortage of rhetoric about creativity and innovation and their
importance to the new economy, city-building, and solving problems in any imaginable field.
The real challenge most cities and communities have is how to translate new thinking in these areas into strategies that have an impact on the ground. Artscape’s unique combination of knowledge-building in the emerging realm of creative community building as well as its track record as a space and place-making enterprise is attracting a growing wave of international interest. This year, Artscape’s CEO, Tim Jones, will speak at more than 20 conferences, seminars, and workshops in Canada, the US and UK including: The World Summit on Arts and Culture (Newcastle/Gateshead, UK), Global Creative Economy Convergence Summit (Philadelphia, USA), International Economic Development Council Conference (New York City, USA), Temple Bar Cultural Trust Symposium
on Urban Regeneration (Dublin, Ireland), London Development Agency (London, UK)
and Artist Workspace Symposium (London,UK).
In addition to building Artscape’s profile and fueling interest in its consulting
practice, these events have allowed Artscape to exchange knowledge and expertise with colleagues from around the world.
Green Arts Barns Campaign News
$10.75 Million Raised to Date!
The Green Arts Barns Capital Campaign continues to build momentum. The official ground breaking grows closer and will take place before April 2007. Artscape staff and volunteers have been fundraising intensely, garnering an additional $1.1 million in support between June
and October, 2006.
In addition to the Capital Campaign, Artscape is working hard to secure
a major commitment from the Province of Ontario and is planning to finance a portion of the project.
A Green Gala Event!
The most steadfast ambassadors for the Green Arts Barns Campaign are members of the local community. Committing to raise $100,000 in support of the Barns, local residents have organized an exciting green culinary gala to take place on Thursday, February 22, 2007!
This event will be built on the tenets of the Green Arts Barns featuring the food and drink of local restaurants and chefs who are challenged to create a special menu item featuring local organic food, as well as the work of local artisans showcased in a live auction.
Campaign Cabinet Set for Success
September, 2006 marked the launch of the public portion of the Green Arts Barns Capital Campaign with the first meeting of the dynamic Campaign Cabinet. Artscape welcomes these new Ambassadors for the Green Arts Barns: chaired by The Honourable Sarmite D. Bulte, former MP for Parkdale-High Park; Jeannie Baxter, Managing Director of Toronto Image Works; Edward Burtynsky, Photographer; Carol McLaughlin, Realtor and Green Arts Barns Community Member; Danny Roth, Public Relations Specialist and Alex Speigel, Architect and Green Arts Barns Community Member. Together, this talented group will utilize their considerable skills to
raise funds for the Green Arts Barns.
Celebrating Volunteer Leadership
Edward Burtynsky has shown exceptional leadership in the Green Arts Barns Capital Campaign. Time and again, Mr. Burtynsky has given us a glimpse inside the Barns through his own lens, first with photographic images presented during Artscape’s Urban Barn Raiser and now with a virtual tour inside the Barns. Mr. Burtynsky extends the range of his ambassadorship for the Green Arts Barns by making it possible for you to step inside each of the Barns with a simple click of your mouse. Visit www.torontoartscape.on.ca/barns to take a tour!
Re-imagining The Barns
An artist’s lens has the ability to re-imagine cold steel, crumbling brick, broken windows or vandalism into beautiful, theatrical images of meticulous colouring, inspirational formations and three dimensional textures.
Inspired by the industrial ingenuity of the former Wychwood TTC Barns, a group of photographers including Barbara Astman, Edward Burtynsky, Susan Dobson, Vid
Ingelevics, Geoffrey James, Katherine Knight and Hugh Martin worked with Artscape to produce a limited number of photographic images depicting the Barns to support fundraising initiatives.
To view the complete catalogue or for ordering information, please contact Elizabeth Dalgleish at 416-392-1038 x 29 or elizabeth@torontoartscape.on.ca. All proceeds from the purchase of these photographs will support the capital development of the Green Arts Barns.
CLICK BELOW to download the full 6-page edition of The Loop Fall/Winter 2006 in pdf format
