Peace Building is a multidisciplinary art installation exploring the theme of “Bridging the Distance”
Centennial College’s School of Communications, Media, Arts, and Design will explore the theme of Peace Building. This ties into the city’s theme of Bridging the Distance by demonstrating how creativity can create change and unify. This multidisciplinary art event at the Story Arts Centre campus draws on the power of the arts for rebuilding connections, healing, and transformation. Examining interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships and conflicts, the programming will exhibit artwork throughout the night created in collaboration by students, alumni, and staff of Centennial College to collectively envision equanimous possibilities that immerse visitors in a harmonious environment. “We are changed by Art and we use it to change others” (Minch, 2016, p. 211).
The programming of Peace Building provides the community opportunity for reflection on how creativity and the arts can quell inner discord, assuage interpersonal turmoil, and be a pathway to personal expression and collective freedom. How can we reduce suffering and experience more equanimity? How can we improve communication and act with more compassion? How can we demonstrate empathy in ways that our actions make ripples throughout Toronto and beyond?
The Peace Building programming draws inspiration from a massive body of artwork focussed on peace, harmony, and justice from the musical recordings of Sam Cooke’s “A Change is Gonna Come” to Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”, to Nan Goldin’s photographic work “Nan one month after being battered”, visual artist David Wojnarowicz’s “Burning House”, and the community collaboration of The Names Project “AIDS Memorial Quilt”. Peace Building builds on these illuminating works and invites the College community to create and contribute to the collected works on these themes. In the words of bell hooks, “rarely, if ever, are any of us healed in isolation. Healing is an act of communion.” (Hooks, 1999, p. 215)
Free as a Bird involves the creation of over 1,000 origami doves to be set free. The College becomes a metaphor for a safe place to land and grow. One by one, the flock of hand-made works amass over the course of the twelve hours becoming a symbolic presence for hope, unity, and peace.
Your Voice Matters invites visitors to sing along with artists performing a concert of 10 songs, each song a cover of a recording from a different decade of the last 100 years. From the 1920s to the present day, each generation grapples with how to end suffering, and throughout history musicians have been agents of change sharing music that has been a powerful driver of what is possible in our society. Throughout the night visitors can experience the electricity of voices harmonizing and people coming together as one.
Minch, M. (2016). “Art, peacebuilding and reconciliation: Will formation and consequence”. In Kim, S., Kollontai, P., & Yore, S. (2016). Mediating peace: Reconciliation through visual art, music and film. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Hooks, B. (2000). All About Love: New Visions. William Morrow, New York.
2024 Activities
7 p.m. – 7 a.m.
Library
Free as a Bird involves the creation of over 1000 origami doves to be set free. The College becomes a metaphor for a safe place to land and grow. One by one, the flock of hand-made works amass over the twelve hours, becoming a symbolic presence for hope, unity, and peace.
Concerts at 7:30 p.m. / 9:00 p.m. / 10:30 p.m. / 12:00 a.m. / 1:30 a.m.
Main Entrance
Your Voice Matters invites visitors to sing along with artists performing a concert of 10 songs, each song a cover of a recording from a different decade of the last 100 years. From the 1920’s to the present day, each generation grapples with how to end suffering, and throughout history musicians have been agents of change sharing music that has been a powerful driver of what is possible in our society. Throughout the night visitors can experience the electricity of voices harmonizing and people coming together as one.
Featuring Daniel Arias, Jacqueline Madsen, Sebastian Londono, Jada Reyes, Vahos
Performances at 7:00 p.m. / 8:30 p.m. / 10:00 p.m. / 11:30 p.m. / 1:00 a.m. / 2:30 a.m.
Courtyard
Eutierria: Becoming One with Nature - Theatre artists perform monologues from existing plays and new works developed by the actors, exploring the experience of connecting with nature. The performances are a meditation on how time in nature can be an antidote to alienation and the ways that can help people become one with the universe. The pop-up performances will be staged throughout the event in the courtyard of the Story Arts Centre.
Featuring Isabella Gutierrez, Michael Madore, Carina Pamanes
7 p.m. – 7 a.m.
Room 255
Together involves creating a new mural to be painted in the “Collabrotorium” at the Story Arts Centre over the course of the all-night art event, which explores unity, diversity, interconnectedness, and people power.
Featuring Kamorudeen Aruna, Bella Brown, Sharmina Habib, Anna Zabashta
7 p.m. – 2 a.m.
Room 106
Infotainment is an interactive exhibit that invites guests to present an AI-generated, 90-second ‘Good News/ Infotainment’ story pre-created from a combination of 3 words. Guests will enter the “green room” and pick a “card” to determine the AI script they will read before heading to the studio to record.
7 p.m. to 3 a.m.
Room 191/193
Say Your Peace is a speaker’s corner experience in which guests respond to the question, “What does peace mean to you?” This work is a collaboration between Journalism and Production Design students and staff. The video recording booth is made of found materials, making this a "zero waste" project.
7 p.m. – 7 a.m.
Room 185
Envision Peace involves a large blank paper canvas available for all visitors to write or draw their answer to the question, "What Brings You Peace?”
- Volunteer OpportunitiesLearn more
Get in touch to find a role that aligns with your interests and skills and be a part of this massive art event happening across the city.
- Paid OpportuntiesLearn more
Origami Project Lead