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windsor lovers represent
February 21, 2009
Windsor’s first ever Pecha Kucha night was a resounding success, with about twice as many attendees as Artcite has available chairs for. The energy in the room was palpable, some fantastic discussions were started, and the last day and a half has seen a metric tonne of enthusiastic feedback landing in my inbox.
If you spend too much time reading the online comments in the Windsor Star, you might get the impression that this town is going to hell in a handbasket. The Big 3 automakers are on bankruptcy’s door and workers are being laid off every day. Much of our downtown is dominated by dance bars that cater to underage Detroit kids (underage there, but not here). Unscrupulous business owners hastily tear down heritage buildings on Sunday mornings without fear of recrimination. It has become near impossible to sell a house here for more than you paid to buy it. We’re facing a shortage of family doctors more acute than any other place in the country. Many of our roads need repaving. Even the bingo halls and strip clubs, whose ability to turn a profit was once as secure as that of Chrysler, Ford and GM, are falling on hard times. And our university, for all its strengths, can’t scrape its sorry ass off the bottom of the Maclean’s rankings no matter how many millions it spends on slick new rebranding packages.
But there is something happening in this town that hasn’t quite made it onto everyone’s radar just yet. Windsor has been hurting economically for a while now, long enough perhaps to have gotten used to a new way of living that other places in the province are only now starting to feel. And maybe that’s part of why there is a movement of change from the ground up happening all over town. It may have all started with the Green Corridor Project, an initiative begun by visual arts instructor Rod Strickland and artist Noel Harding which brings together students from disparate areas such as visual arts, architecture and engineering, partnering with the city and members of the community to redevelop the area surrounding the bridge that links Windsor with Detroit. There seems to be a groundswell of energy for community-building projects in Windsor right now, and for our first Pecha Kucha night I sought out a few of the people at the centre of it to speak about possibilities for engaging with this community we live in and love.
I’d like to say an enormous thank you to our seven presenters, to Artcite for generously allowing us the use of their space and their equipment for the evening, and to the very many people who attended and took part in the spirited discussion that followed. And to everyone who spoke to me afterward expressing an interest in presenting at a future installment: you will definitely be hearing from me.
Some photos from the night:
Mita Williams (Leddy Library, University of Windsor): The City as Playground
Rod Strickland (School of Visual Arts, University of Windsor): Open Corridor
Tom Lucier (Phog Lounge): No More Bemoaning: Growing Windsor’s Creative Class
Pina and Adriano Ciotoli (WindsorEats.com): Eat Your City
Andrew Foot (InternationalMetropolis.com): Architectural Desecration
Justin Langlois (School of Visual Arts, University of Windsor): How to Fix the City: Social Practice in Windsor
Only a small slice of the large crowd; there were several more rows of people standing behind those you see at the bottom of the second image, plus a whole other side of the room beyond that wall to the left. Seriously. Packed.
If you missed the event, you’re in luck! Tom Lucier also thoughtfully recorded video of all six presentations and posted them on his personal weblog.
Posted by jodi on February 21, 2009 at 6.32pm
Categories: border city stars
Comments on "windsor lovers represent"
well done! looks great.
Posted by Amelia on February 24, 2009 at 2.05pm :: link
[...] windsor lovers represent | [...]
Posted by jodi’s weblog on February 27, 2009 at 10.40am :: link
[...] was a speaker at Windsor’s Talk20 – Windsor’s first Pecha Kucha night. It was held at Artcite on February 19, 2009. My 20 [...]
Posted by Talk20 at Artcite on October 15, 2010 at 4.36pm :: link