COMMUNITY PROJECTS

LATEST PROJECTS

September- December 2013

Rewilding Vancouver

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeMV8hPFRhU&list=PLK1TK6eY3GAj37heGC_vqYJFR8KZ_1rvS&index=8

REWILDING VANCOUVER is a dynamic community mapping, storytelling & visioning project in partnership with Emily Carr University and Design, the David Suzuki Foundation (DSF) and in affiliation with the Museum of Vancouver (MOV). ECUAD Students each individually created short 3-4 minute digital narratives on 15 different 'wild sites' in Vancouver. The 'wild sites' consisted of intact and restored nature parks, as well as engineered sites designed with green infrastructure to encourage natural spaces within the city. The project aimed to help reconnect Metro Vancouver residents with our city’s “wild side” (i.e. the historical natural environment) while inspiring various municipalities to follow the lead of some best practices. The project was featured in the Museum of Vancouver's exhibition, "Rewilding Vancouver" (2014).

Joni Danielson's 'wild site' was Creekway Park - a new park in Vancouver featuring a daylighted stream. Creekway Park is located between New Brighton Park and Hastings Park in the Hastings Sunrise Community. Completed in September 2013, it is the first step in daylighting Hastings Creek and naturalizing Hastings Park. Once completed, 1.2km of stream will have been daylighted, originating from the Sanctuary in Hastings Park and flowing into the Burrard Inlet through New Brighton Park. Joni interviewed Mark Angelo, who has been an advocate of the project since the early 1990's.

January-April 2013

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Forgotten Waters

http://artistslearningtogether.wordpress.com/week-four-forgotten-waters/

This project was a part of a larger collaboration called, "Arists Learning Together" which brought Emily Carr students together with students from the Britannia Secondary School Alternative program to make art and learn together.

Joni's project used methods of creative and community mapping to reflect and respond to the loss of Vancouver’s streams and the shrinking of False Creek due to the industrialization of Vancouver. She was interested in examining the impact of the industrialization and colonization of Vancouver. Working together with students from the 8J/9J and Outreach programs, a large scale map of False Creek was created in the classroom. The students investigated issues of place and community, while paying particular attention to the region’s environmental transition.

January-April 2012

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Off the Wall!

Off the Wall! is a seven week after school art program for grades 4-7 students at Sir Wilfred Laurier Elementary in Vancouver. In school, children typically create 2-D artworks that can be displayed on the wall. This program aimed to expand children's creative potential by taking their creativity and art "off the wall" and into physical spaces where they could interact with their art. The children learned about art forms such as installation art, guerilla art, earth art and temporary, non-damaging forms of graffiti. The children learned to examine art in relationship to its environment, as well as consider how viewers may engage with their art.

September- December 2012

Natural Capital

http://www.davidsuzuki.org/issues/wildlife-habitat/projects/natural-capital/nat-cap-map.php

What is nature worth?
The Natural Capital Project is an interactice community mapping and storytelling project designed to promote the non-market value of nature's essential ecosystem services in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada, and shed new light of the importance of fragile wetland ecosystems in people's lives. The project used digital storytelling to highlight the cultural, recreational, spritual, and health benefits wetlands provide to communities. The project was developed in partnership between Emily Carr University of Art + Design, Ontario College of Art and Design, and the David Suzuki Foundation. Through a dynamic and collaborative approach to documentary practices, ECUAD students (such as myself) from a variety of levels and disciplines created a series of digital narratives for an app in development by the David Suzuki Foundation designed to bring to life their report on aquatic ecosystems in British Coloumbia's Lower Mainland.

Joni's video focuses on Camosun Bog in Pacific Spirit Park. She chose to interview Gallop Fan, a youth from Catching the Spirit Youth Society's leadership program to highlight the importance of the site to Metro Vancouver youth. Catching the Spirit holds overnight youth camps in Pacific Spirit Park. Their campsite is a short walk from the bog, and they often visit the bog at night; the bog is a memorable and magical place for the youth in the program. Catching the Spirit's Youth have also volunteered many hours to the restoration of Camosun Bog and Pacific Spirit Park through a series of stewardship projects.

For more information on the project, you can read the following article published in the New York based magazine, "Sustainability":
http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdfplus/10.1089/SUS.2013.9838

Or you can visit the following website:
http://www.davidsuzuki.org/issues/wildlife-habitat/projects/natural-capital/nat-cap-map.php