Two summer workshops offered participants an artistic outlet to explore local ecosystems and ecological interactions. Fifty people, including students and community members, took part in the Creative Ecologies Masterclasses.

The first Creative Ecologies Masterclass was delivered in creative partnership with Art Windsor-Essex (AWE). It was taught by bioartist and Master of Fine Arts student Garvin Chinnia. Participants used handheld microscopes and found objects to create original artwork.

The second offering sent participants on an adventure to Essex County to visit JEM Farms, a Leamington greenhouse operation. Tom Schnekenburger, UWindsor director of research partnerships, led a tour of the facility and spoke about Agriculture UWindsor, a Centre of Excellence partnership that supports research, community, and collaboration in the agriculture sector.

“Windsor-Essex is North America’s largest cluster of greenhouses growing fruits and vegetables and these highly complex and technologically advanced environments are supported by a huge ecosystem of growers, specialists, and scientists,” says Schnekenburger.

“The work with the Creative Ecologies group is an important reminder of the role agriculture plays in our lives and need for secure food systems that support a growing population.”

Chinnia brought the creative side into the workshop by creating an outdoor scavenger hunt that tied together agriculture, landscape, and drawing. Gem Farms encouraged everyone to load up on free produce from its bountiful crops.

Jaclyn Meloche is the project lead as well as an instructor in the School of Creative Arts.

“These classes are community partnerships in different ways that we didn’t anticipate and really they are pilot projects for what we could offer next,” says Dr. Meloche.

“It’s nice to see the social scientists and the scientists work so seamlessly together on the faculty side and the student side.”

The Faculty of Science, the Faculty of Engineering, and the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Science collaborate on the Masterclasses series. The next courses will be offered in music and film in Fall 2024.

The series is funded by a one-year Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) program grant and it is sponsored by UWindsor’s Science Meets Art (SMArt) Communications initiative.

As a culmination of the entire series, the School of Creative Arts will host a SMArt Communications exhibition — curated by graduate students Grace Dycha and Robyn-Jean Susko — featuring content generated by participants.