2022 – Caleb Bray, Sophia Chilton, and Silas Chinsen

Project overview

Reshaping Ruins was an interactive art project that nurtured the community’s connection between the historic past and vibrant present of Goldie Mill Ruins. The project reanimated Goldie Mill by bringing community-made visual art, poetry, and music into the space.

Concept and community engagement

The project began with a call for poetry, with the winning submission being used as the text for a choral composition, based on the creative prompt “How does it feel to experience an old space in a new light?” Local singers of any experience level were invited to an interactive workshop where they learned, performed, and recorded the choir piece. The choral recordings were then be manipulated into a more abstract, ambient track played during the exhibition to inspire the visual art component.

The culminating exhibition featured collaborative painting projections, light, and sound. The projection consisted of abstract and gestural painting, paired with video footage of life in Guelph. The collaborative painting mixed with the music, and animated the sounds flowing through the space, while the videos highlighted the movements of people and nature in Guelph bringing the motion of life into the ruins. The works were projected in real-time as the audience interacted with the space, casting shadows onto the old building and bringing it to life with movement.

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