Creative Activism
Exhibition Dates: March 6 – April 13, 2008
Opening Reception: March 6, 2008
Artists, activists and community members are taking their issues to the streets and engaging in a new creative form of activism. A new form of creative activism has surfaced within urban centres across the world. No longer interested in marching with signs and negotiating with bureaucratic structures, this new wave fosters stewardship for one’s neighborhood and community. People are taking their issues to the streets and engaging in interventions.
United by the cause of individual and collective self-determination their new form is engaging in creative interventions to make our cities livable places. By taking it to our streets they are directing their energy towards collaboratively building new visions for livable cities—they are taking civic improvement into their own hands.
photo (DIY Bike Lanes by Urban Repair Squad)
People are: painting their own bike lanes—where before there were none, guerrilla gardening in orphaned spaces, mapping surveillance free walks in downtown areas. Some artists, activists, architects, urban planners and other creatives have stopped asking for policy changes from their governments and are creating change through social engagement and intervention.
The goal of this exhibition is to begin creating an archive of this changing movement, to inspire new projects and to create a broader awareness for creative activism. -Curated by Heather Haynes
ARTISTS:
Jennifer Delos Reyes, February Group, Maxime Hourani, Deborah Margo, Barbara Menely, Dave Meslin, Markus Miessen & Patricia Reed, The Movement Movement, October Group, Darren O’Donnell & Natalie De Vito, Planning Action, Resident Rising, Neighbourhood Action and East Scarborough Storefront, Kerri Lynn Reeves, Auriane Sokoloski, Streets Are For People!, Nick Tobier, Urban Repair Squad and Elinor Whidden.
MEDIA:
spacing.ca Toronto Free Gallery heads west with Creative Activism
By Shawn Micallef http://spacing.ca/toronto/2008/03/19/event-guide-toronto-free-gallery-heads-west-with-creative-activism/
