Since 2007, The City of Calgary’s Utilities & Environmental Protection (UEP) Department had been initiating and supporting ground breaking public art. These projects were usually highly integrated and realized through extensive interdisciplinary collaboration. Engineers, artists, architects, and City staff were working together to increase Calgarians’ understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of our most sustainable resource, the Bow River and its watershed.

This interview shares the experiences and insights of City of Calgary staff from UEP about incorporating public art into projects.

Dale Hodges Park was the recipient of the Shared Footprints Award from the Emerald Foundation at the 29th Annual Emerald Awards that celebrate environmental achievements across Alberta. This project was one of the programs largest single undertakings and is the culmination of many disciplines collaborating together. Led by Watershed+ Lead Artist, Sans façon, the award is shared with O2 Planning + Design, Source2Source, AECOM, Wilco Contractors Southwest Inc., and the staff at City of Calgary Public Art, Water Resources, and Parks.

Thank you to the Alberta Emerald Foundation for this honour and their continued efforts in featuring environmental achievements and stewardship across Alberta.

Learn more about the award here.

Watch the newly released film by artist Steve Gurysh. Parts per trillion takes us on an extraordinary and beautiful journey, delving into the creative process from inception through to fruition.

Steve had the unique opportunity to work alongside employees and within the processes of the Utilities & Environmental Protection Department of the City of Calgary. Parts per trillion is the culmination of research, engagement with employees and citizens, development, and distillation over a period of three years. Archiving the remnant traces of human activity, Parts per trillion provides insight into the effects we have on nature and our watershed.

This work was developed while Steve participated in Watershed+ Dynamic Environment Lab, a City of Calgary Public Art Program.

In Reservoir, Peter von Tiesenhausen collaborated with sound artists Jen Reimer and Magnus Tiesenhausen and cinematographer Dave McGregor to capture the immense space and presence of the Saddleridge reservoir through sound and video. This project was developed while the artist was embedded in the UEP Department during the Watershed+ Dynamic Environment Lab.

Hidden beneath two soccer fields, the Saddleridge reservoir provides drinking water that originates from the Bow Glacier and watershed to north-eastern Calgary. With the capacity to hold 38 million litres of water, the reservoir has remained sealed to the outside world for forty years, sitting in darkness and silence as it supplied water until it was opened for scheduled maintenance in the spring of 2017. The underground concrete chamber is unlike any surroundings we are familiar with. The smallest of sounds will echo throughout the vast empty space and certain frequencies build upon themselves, intensifying in resonance. The improvised sound performance and fleeting images explore the unique nature and ambience of the space and combine to create Reservoir. Once maintenance was completed the colossal chamber was refilled, restoring it to silence for the next forty years.

This work is on view at Contemporary Calgary as part of the Dynamic Environment exhibition until January 5, 2020.

Previously shown at TRUCK Contemporary Art and the Art Gallery of Alberta in 2018.