Ward 9 Community Run Public Art GrantS
Calgary Arts Development (CADA) recently launched their 2024 public art grant program for community led projects. Recognizing that public art opportunities can come from grassroots ideas that are initiated and led by communities, CADA invites proposals for community-run public art projects. This competitive opportunity is open to community-run organizations, including informal groups that define themselves in terms of distinct communities, neighbourhood associations, and non-profit or charitable organizations.
While the program is open to all communities in Calgary, CADA will be providing bonus points for applications coming from neighborhoods that don’t currently have public art or programming from their operating grant clients.
The Ward 9 neighborhoods eligible for bonus points on their application include:
Belvedere
Eastfield
Erin Woods
Forest Lawn Industrial
Golden Triangle
Ogden Shops
Red Carpet
Starfield
Twinhills
Valleyfield
You can learn more about the program here. The application deadline is September 4, 2024.
New Public Art in Calgary: Reconnecting to the Bow
Calgarians have been taking to the Bow River in record numbers this summer, with people floating down the river and enjoying spending time at Harvey Passage. Starting August 12th and running until the end of December 2024, Reconnecting to the Bow invites Calgarians to phone the Bow - simply dial 1-855-BOW-LSTN / 1-855-269-5786 to hear the Bow’s rushing, gurgling, and babbling voice on the other end of the line.
Through a simple phone call, anyone can connect to the Bow, creating a unique opportunity to access and explore our relationship with this important body of water. Several text-based artworks enticing people to listen to the Bow will appear throughout the city on billboards, at transit stations, and on social media platforms.
The project reminds us that the Bow River is a central character in the past, present and future stories of this place. By revisiting a temporary time-based public artwork from 2014 a decade later, this project serves as an opportunity to activate Calgary’s public art collection and weaves this artwork into the fabric of the city and the daily lives of Calgarians.
Reconnecting to the Bow is a response to an earlier artwork in the City of Calgary Public Art Collection created by Broken City Lab in July 2014 during the collective’s residency in the City of Calgary’s Watershed + public art program. Now, a decade later, Broken City Lab is responding to this work and considering the many changes that have taken place over the last decade regarding the significance of the river in our community. This new artwork, Reconnecting to the Bow, will also be part of the Public Art Collection.
