Corporate body

City of Winnipeg 2012 Earth Day Art Activity Working Group

2012

Acting on advice from the Mayor’s Environmental Advisory Committee in 2011, the Executive Policy Committee of the City of Winnipeg directed city staff to coordinate a free art activity with a future-oriented sustainability theme through existing child and youth drop-in programs in City recreation centres. A working group consisting of representatives from Planning, Property and Development (Environmental Coordinator), Community Services, the City of Winnipeg Archives, and the Winnipeg Arts Council planned the activity and engaged a mentoring artist, Craig Love, to work with City recreation technicians to deliver the art activity to children and youth at five City of Winnipeg recreation centres (East End Cultural Centre, Norberry-Glenlee, Westdale Community Centre, Magnus Eliason Recreation Centre, and Turtle Island Neighbourhood Centre). During spring break, children and youth participants made quilt-like squares using mostly natural, sustainable, and some recycled materials. Themes that inspired the children included the earth, ecology, nature, home, and sustainability. The activity promoted greater understanding of how and why daily efforts of sustainability matter. The forty craft works created represent the children’s wish-list for the future of the city and the world. After public exhibition at City Hall in mid-April and at the Millennium Library on Earth Day itself (Sunday, April 22), five representative squares, a folder of conceptual drawings created by the children as they planned their projects, and a photographic record of the project were delivered to the City of Winnipeg Archives so that they can be made available at a future date. Photographs of the five representative works were used to advertise Earth Day 2012 and posted to the Winnipeg Arts Council website. The photographer for the project was William Eakin.

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2021-03-26: creation