The Opening at OISE

Our opening was a success - how can I possibly say thank you except, thank you! - to every one who came out. I was overawed by the beauty of it all. More than 75 people were in attendance. Project artists who came out - thanks - and to all of those who could not make it - I hold you in my heart...
The people who saw the work have continued to call and email, providing their support. We gathered 9 cameras. Not bad. We still need more. But 9 is fabulous. And Rae grabbed one to document the event. So I guess we had 10 at one point! Rae was happy, saying: "They like us!" They do. I think, I believe, this work can make a difference. And to show it at this educational insitute has the potential to alter the way teachers and learners engage. And we received support to exhibit the work from the Ontario Arts Council, Exhibition Assitance Program with the help of our recommender, Gallery 44 - Thanks to them as well!
I have promised to put information about the project on this site and to upload photographs. And so I will. Over time.
I was excited and scared. Was not sure if people would come. The challenge was to hold this tension, to be awake in it and to notice by inhabiting the experience. And the questions continue: How do we use the work to encourage thought, to encourage us to think differently about personal and structural inequity as it is expressed socially? How can we work against the collapse of hope? It is growing cold. Doors are being locked more frequently and we are preparing for numerous programs that help to sustain the poor to close. There is more to write... but that will have to come later. Other tasks await.

balancing act

Have been working all week to get ready for the exhibit - it's a balancing act. Daughters want dinner and i am not certain that is part of the balance! But it has to be. I am excited and nervous - it is anticipatory dread. There is much to do. Have to take the show down at ZigZag and get it up at OISE. The same night we will be at Sneaky Dee's with Street Health and Rock for Humanity - a group who is donating their fundraising efforts to help Street Health. We were at the Horseshoe about 3 weeks ago doing the same thing. It was fun to talk about the work in this environment.

I am hoping that anyone who is reading this makes it out to the opening at OISE, comes to see the work at Sneaky Dee's, or the Brampton Independent Arts Festival - more on that one later. Because there is also the EcoArts Festival... and others. They will all make their appearance here.

But my main priority is to do the fundraising to start the next project, in/vulnerabilities. We have only had one camera donated to date ...

And we need more. The project will be to work with Street Health again and to work in a cultural production workshop using photography to tell more of the stories using text and image. We have been blessed with funding from the Toronto Arts Council, Access Grant, but we need our material costs to be covered.

the homeless and the insecurely housed
are now appearing in documents coded with the language of corporate
strategies where millions of dollars are spent insulating silos
and this morning one of them will wake up
dead from some unanticipated opportunity taken by
exposure or dehydration, which has targeted this one for
confusion. For upon awakening he (or she) will surely determine that death

was not an annotation in their daybook. There were the other things listed: put an end to hunger, find love, vote for housing. She (or he) was certain that finding a graceful exit strategy was a practiced skill for use in the short-term.

an increasing flutter of white papers darkening your corner office.

a day in the life

the exhibit is going to happen.
we got funding from the Ontario Arts Council, Exhibition Assistance. THANK YOU!
OPENING RECEPTION: MONDAY, JANUARY 29, 2007 at 5:30

MONDAY, JANUARY 29 – THURSDAY, FEBRARY 23, 2007
252 BLOOR STREET WEST 2ND FLOOR HALLWAY BETWEEN 2-212/2-213

I am hoping to be able to find the members of our group - because we did not get the last grant we applied for there has been a lapse in continuity. I still remember the meeting where I broke down and cried because we had no money to continue. Everyone came over, sang silly songs, gave me hugs. Made it better.

Except social inequity is not ok. We want people to see the work. We want understanding of these issues. We want change. So what's it about?

The images in the exhibit are selected from a vast number shot over a period of 8 months, in a community-based photography project where cameras were given to women and men who were experiencing insecure housing and homelessness, social exclusion, and poverty. This exhibition reveals photography as, and in, ethically transformative relationships where there is an opportunity to begin to promote empathic identification between the viewer and the one who is viewed.

being and doing

first post. about being an artist, writer, researcher, educator. writing 3 or 4 papers, trying to find time to get the book done, to stay up with reading, to write lectures, to love my family and friends. and to remind myself of the wonders that flourish. and to assist in the flourishing.
about to start a new project. finishing up another one. and I am going to try and use this blog as a way of recording these projects, these endings and beginnings.
and i guess part of it is about being the "artist and scholar" at the Centre for Arts-informed Research at OISE/UT. The first one there. And the struggle to balance this role, to integrate it, with all those other ones!