UPEI Canadian Centre for Climate Change and Adaptation hosts new exhibition
The UPEI Canadian Centre for Climate Change and Adaptation (CCCCA), in St. Peter’s Bay, PEI, is hosting an exhibition titled “Mowing the Lawn” by Climate Artist-in-Residence Carrie Allison.
In the exhibition, Allison delves into local ecologies and their national and global connections. This research-oriented exhibition examines the colonial history of monocultures, turf grass, and lawns, while highlighting their climate implications. By experimenting with new materials and blending digital and handmade elements, the exhibition envisions liberated landscapes through interactive sculptures and mixed media drawings.
For the past couple of years, Allison has created beaded artworks that critique monocultures, turf grass, and lawns as extensions of the agricultural history imposed by governments on the landscape and its inhabitants. These issues are directly related to abolition movements, Indigenous LANDBACK conversations, anti-colonial struggles, and global liberation efforts.
During the ten-month Climate Artist-in-Residency program, Allison has continued this ongoing body of work. In November 2023, Allison traveled to PEI and conducted research on agricultural grass practices by visiting Island Grown Sod and Quality Sheep, a farm that relies on animal grazing to rehabilitate overworked agricultural land. This residency has allowed Allison to engage in slow, meaningful research and experiment with new materials, exploring how the digital and handmade can come together to create new futures and possibilities for liberated landscapes.
"Mowing the Lawn" features a series of humorous signs in astroturf sculptures, drawing from political campaign signs and those asking people to “Stay off the grass!” These signs have scannable QR codes linking to an online visual board presenting Allison’s research. Also on display are three wood and velvet drawings inspired by her childhood lawns. Using Google Maps, Allison revisited previous addresses where she had lived and depicted lawn shapes by omitting buildings and driveways. Birch panels were cut into lawn shapes and filled with velvet, inspired by literature promoting the propaganda of “velvet carpet” front lawns.
Art works from this exhibition will be adapted and toured to the FOFA Gallery in Montreal, Quebec, and the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie in Grande Prairie, Alberta, in 2025.
Allison is a multidisciplinary visual artist of nêhiýaw/cree, Métis, and mixed European descent based in K’jipuktuk, Mi’kma’ki (Halifax, Nova Scotia). She grew up on the unceded and unsurrendered lands of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations, with maternal roots and relations based in maskotewisipiy (High Prairie, Alberta), Treaty 8. She holds a Master of Fine Arts degree, a Bachelor of Arts in Art History, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University. She was the 2020 recipient of the Melissa Levin Award from the Textile Museum of Canada and long-listed for the 2021 and the 2024 Sobey Art Award. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally.
The exhibition is the result of a ten-month Climate Artist-in-Residence program presented by Creative PEI in partnership with the CCCCA, with This Town is Small as the community partner, and curated by Alexis Bulman, with financial support from the Government of PEI's Climate Challenge Fund (CC Fund). The CC Fund aims to support the development of innovative solutions to the threat of climate change by empowering people of different backgrounds, experiences, and expertise, who work across sectors and in different communities throughout the Island, to contribute to climate action in PEI.
The gallery at the Canadian Centre for Climate Change and Adaptation is open to the public from 9:30 am–4:00 pm on August 2 and 16.
