Flowers for Dentonia Park: بيتنا و عملنا (Our home & Our work)

Waard Ward and photographer Darren Rigo collaborate to create a public art installation that explores issues of creative labour and centres newcomer perspectives. Curated by Nashwa Lina Khan.

Flowers for Dentonia Park explores the ways that the value of labour does not always translate easily across borders. In particular, creative labour is often undervalued, especially from newcomer communities. Centering newcomer perspectives, Waard Ward utilizes floristry and gardening to re-imagine how we might better recognize the work and skills of newcomers. We wish to embody a future where the labour and expertise of newcomers is valued, and barriers to meaningful work are addressed through community-led supports. 

Presented in the centre of Dentonia Park, this public art project is a collaboration between the socially engaged practice of Waard Ward and the photographic and artistic practice of Darren Rigo. Together, we expand our definitions of ‘livelihood’ to include art, creativity, and flowers. 

Special thanks to collaborating artist Nicolas Fleming. 

Darren Rigo is a Toronto-based artist who creates work inspired by the absurdity in everyday life. His practice focuses on collaborative relationships with people and places as a source of inspiration while considering the endlessly evolving nature of photography. He received a BFA from OCAD University where he majored in photography and recently completed residencies at AIAV (Japan), Leveld Kunstnartun (Norway), AIRY (Japan). His work has also been included in the collections of the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton and the Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts in Japan.

Waard Ward creates floral arrangements, builds community gardens, and invites newcomers to train as florists and imagine social-entrepreneurial futures. Collectively led by Syrian florist Abd Al-Mounim, community organizers/newcomers Hanen Nanaa and Shoruk Alsakni, educator Laura Ritacca, curator/educator Patricia Ritacca, and artist Petrina Ng, Waard Ward collaborates in floristry, decolonial research, and newcomer support. Waard Ward’s name proposes the idea of a diasporic flower district; “waard” is a romanization of the Arabic word for flower. 

Nashwa Lina Khan (she/her) is a community educator, facilitator, and researcher. She is also a writer and poet and occasionally dabbles in installation and archive that uses narrative methodologies. She holds a Masters of Environmental Studies from York University with areas of concentration focused on narrative methodologies, community and public health, refugee, and forced migration studies. She is currently a PhD student in the faculty of Environment and Urban Change and curating/supporting the On Display/For Review artist residency at Whippersnapper. nashwa is currently working on a chapbook project, with the BIPOC advisory committee at telefilm Canada and a researcher with Proclaiming Our Roots, the University of Alberta and Rainbow Faith and Freedom. you can find her cultural commentary on the podcast Habibti Please and on twitter where you can find her tweeting too little or too much.