If Project Warp has anything to say about Ottawa’s boring reputation, it’s that it’s about to change. At least, that’s what it hopes to achieve by uplifting the city’s motivated and artistic minds through its creative mentorship program.
Project Warp is a three-week paid program organized by four art collectives in Ottawa: Debaser, The Framework, Produced By Youth and the Moving Art Gallery. Located at the Arts Court from Oct. 15 until the end of November, the project aims to teach mentees how to plan creative events.
“The aim for Project Warp is to just empower people in Ottawa who want to do events but who don’t know where to start,” said Sandra Ngenge Dusabe, a program mentor and a member of the project’s board of directors.
One of Project Warp’s goals is to diversify Ottawa’s arts scene. Members of traditionally underrepresented and marginalized groups, such as BIPOC and LGBTQ+ folks, were encouraged to apply.
The program features workshops on event planning, accessibility planning, live sound, safer spaces and harm reduction. One of the workshops, “Lunch & Learns,” provides mentees with event planning fundamentals, such as financial management skills, networking and logistics.
Mentees will also have a one-on-one shadowing opportunity during a live sound event with Nick Schofield, a mentor and the technical director of Club SAW.
“In many ways, the technician is the point between the artists and the audience,” he said. “Having technical knowledge can help inform whatever role you have in event production, whether it’s as an artist, organizer or venue staff.”
Schofield said he is excited to see the events the mentees produce from the program after its conclusion.
“We always want to see new artists being presented,” he said. “This program is going to uplift and support [new artists].”
“Some of the topics here that [Project Warp] is offering are really interesting and are things that maybe I haven’t really gotten the chance to know from professionals,” Uyanze said. “It’s good to hear from people who do that every day.”
Uyanze said she is specifically interested in learning how to budget properly and professionally. The skills she acquires during the program will be put toward her proposed event and career in general, she added.
Mentees are given a $5,000 honorarium to support a proposed project, which they were encouraged to budget and plan in their initial application. The proposed events will happen after the mentorship program finishes in November. Uyanze’s proposed event is a workshop series that teaches video editing.
“The fact that you get a [honorarium] at the end of the program really validates [your] ideas,” she said. “People want to invest in you making that idea possible.”
Dusabe said Project Warp and the honorarium wouldn’t have been possible without significant funding from the Canada Council for the Arts.
“Ottawa could have so many interesting people doing interesting, creative things, but without these kinds of projects, it’s really hard to get people to do this kind of creative work because it costs a lot of money,” Dusabe said. “It makes money, but it also costs money.”
Dusabe said she believes investing in initiatives like Project Warp is in Ottawa’s best interest.
“Project Warp can only really continue if we have that support from people who live here,” she said. “One way to get more of that is [to] abandon this really old and tired trope that Ottawa is a place that no one can have fun at all.”
Featured image by Tanitoluwa Olorunyomi.
