The iconic Chicken On The Way, just one of the many places to love in Calgary
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Two different versions of the motives behind video artist Sharon Stevens’s current project, OX: A Crash Course on Loving Calgary, were overheard at CJSW’s 25th anniversary party. The first was that the artist hates Calgary so much that she embarked on the project in an effort to find something to love about it. The second was that Stevens is so tired of hearing other people complain about the city that she wanted to show them how great it is.
The truth, according to Stevens, is that both versions are accurate. She says that a couple of years ago, there was some buzz in the media about artists leaving town because the political climate deadens artistic creativity, but she felt tied to the city and wanted to find a way to overcome that challenge. “I really started thinking, ‘I have to find ways to love this city because I’m not leaving.’ ”
In addition to being an award-winning artist, Stevens works part-time at city hall, where she hears plenty of complaints, and part-time at the Arusha Centre, where she works to build a better community. “I guess because of those kinds of worlds that I work in…. I wanted to find a project that looks to the positives, not the negatives,” she says. “I feel like I’m finally integrating all of my lives.”
In her quest, Stevens has spent the past year recording and filming Calgarians from varying demographics talking about what they love about Calgary. She also invited people to go to their favourite spot in the city, install an OX flag, take a photo or video, and record a short story about their choice. The result is OX (a nod to the Year of the Ox, as well as the more obvious hugs and kisses), a virtual walking tour of what there is to love about Calgary. The locations so far include everything from the Unitarian Church on 16th Ave. N.W., to Chicken on the Way in Kensington.
“It’s made people who don’t consider themselves to be artists to consider this unique and creative way to express themselves,” says Stevens.
One of those people is longtime Calgarian Tara Sukut, who says the toughest part of the assignment was narrowing her choices down to one location. “It was a fun journey to look back through my life,” she says. “You have an emotional connection to this city that you’re in and it’s not just streets and places and trees.”
Ultimately, she chose her first apartment, located above Dairy Lane in Hillhurst-Sunnyside, because for her it represented independence, broadening horizons and new friendships. “I boiled it down to that feeling when I really became part of the community,” Sukut says. “To live above there in that little nondescript apartment was a really special time.”
Stevens says OX was inspired by similar projects in other cities that appealed to her preference for participatory art, which she embraced several years ago as a way to give people access to tools that were not so accessible — that was in the days before anyone could take a video and post it on YouTube.
“I really saw video as a means for people to express their stories, but I didn’t want to be the one who held the power,” she says.
Although cameras and video recorders are a lot easier to come by now, Stevens says technology is still a hurdle for some people, and she couldn’t have pulled off the project without the assistance of Emmedia, where she is artist-in-residence. The project website (essense.ca/ox) will launch at noon on Saturday, February 13, followed by a screening, listening and recording party at the Emmedia Gallery from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. OX will also be part of a participatory exhibition at Truck Gallery at the end of April.
But the affair between Calgary and its residents won’t end there — Stevens plans to continue spreading the love online indefinitely. To contribute to the project, record your story, take a photo, link it to Google maps and then upload your offering to post@ox.posterous.com.
To see Sharon Steven's favourite place in Calgary click here.
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