Are you heading to Nocturne, Halifax’s annual Art-at-Night public art festival this weekend?
This year, our very own MSVU Art Gallery Director Melanie Colosimo will be featured at Nocturne with her submission Road to Nowhere being selected as a beacon project*. Road to Nowhere stands as a representation of displacement caused by the Cogswell Interchange prompting us to reflect on the challenges that result from urban development and persisting social issues.
Road to Nowhere is an impression of the former Cogswell Interchange overpass that was torn down over the last year expressed as an inflatable. The Cogswell Interchange overpass was part of the redevelopment of Halifax in the 1960s; the overpass was built with the intention of linking it to a freeway connecting downtown Halifax to the rest of Nova Scotia. Even though the project wasn’t fulfilled in the end, the roadwork addition to Halifax resulted in the demolition of low-income housing and commercial property in the area.
On October 18, join Melanie for an Artist Talk at the Halifax Central Library (5th floor) from 1:30 to 2:30 p.m., where she will discuss Road to Nowhere and her creative process.
Road to Nowhere can be found at stop 410 on the Nocturne map at the corner of Cogswell and Gottingen Streets in Downtown Halifax on Saturday, October 19 (map found here). Read more about Road to Nowhere and all the other featured works via Nocturne’s 2024 Project list.
*Beacon projects are artist-led works submitted to Nocturne’s annual call for projects and selected through a selection committee/jury process. The projects are funded by Nocturne and artists receive a CARFAC artist fee and costs to cover expenses associated with the project. They are usually site specific and located in public (or publicly accessible spaces) throughout the festival zones.