Co-curated by Blair Fornwald, and myself Kaffeklatsch was a free artist talk and workshop series centering older voices. It invited older artists and those who work with intergenerational cohorts to talk about their work and experiences in a friendly atmosphere, akin to visiting over coffee or a crafting bee. The main presenters invited a guest of their choice to engage in conversation with. The result was a five-part talk and workshop series that offered intersectional and interdisciplinary perspectives on art, community, identity, and aging, as well as hands-on insight into the main presenter’s practices through adjacent workshops.

You can find all of the past talks online on the School of art gallery youtube page.

In conjunction with the Wane One exhibition, youth were invited to immerse themselves in an underground, urban subway station, a place where graffiti art culture was conceptualized, and explore their own individuality by creating a unique tag, or stylized symbol. These symbols were created by the use of colourful paint markers on translucent vellum paper, and were then installed and backlit using giant light boxes, imitating subway station advertisements. These graffiti-decorated light boxes were shown in the Kids Gallery alongside, and for the duration of, Wane’s exhibition.

In conjunction with a group show titled Deep Dive, curated by Gwen Trutnau, participants were invited to repurpose found objects into works of art, and to create collaborative drawings using prompts and games. This combined drawing and sculptural workshop, took place entirely inside a simulated “living room” within the gallery. The workshop explored the potential to up-cycle materials, work collaboratively, and reimagined a new potential for discarded items. The youth’s sculptural pieces and drawings were shown in the William Feldman Gallery, an exhibition space located in Graffiti Gallery, dedicated entirely to featuring work produced by youth participants.

Jean Borbridge and Patrick Skene (Pip Skid) were invited to create a collaborative mural with youth from Art City. The mural depicted a giant street party! Drawings from the youth of Art City were incorporated into the mural.

In conjunction with the Frontier School Divisions Anual Juried Student Show; participants were invited to create a unique and personal pop up Desire Path. Desire Paths are paths that have made themselves, they are walkways forged out of the necessity to create a more natural way of movement from place to place outside of the gridlock of urban planning. Each participant were asked to create a map that explores their movement throughout their communities, past or present. Places, or landmarks that the participants frequently visit or that hold significance in their travels. These paths were placed on the map as a pop up landmarks. The gallery walls were painted with the map of Point Douglas to compliment the participants artwork.