The Spade & The Soil

AUArts

Please join us at the Kiyooka Ohe Arts Centre (KOAC) for a sculpture park tour and a roundtable discussion on October 17, 2026.

Kiyooka Ohe Arts Centre

Please join us at the Kiyooka Ohe Arts Centre (KOAC) for a sculpture park tour and a roundtable discussion inspired by Katie Ohe’s living legacy and Elaine Cameron Weir’s solo exhibition, Bookends on view at the Illingworth Kerr Gallery, AUArts (September 18 – November 21, 2026).September 17 – registration opens to AUArts students October 5 – registration and waitlist opens to public Registration is limited so please register early. Visitors will be responsible for finding their own transportation to KOAC.Event schedule12:45 pm: Participant arrival, please park in the top parking lot and check in with the staff member. 1 pm: Sculpture park tour led by Shelby Charlesworth 2:30 pm: Reception in Harry Kiyooka’s studio. Light refreshments provided 3 pm: Roundtable discussion with Ash Slemming, Shelby Charlesworth and Tak Pham 4.30 pm: End of the roundtable, guests are invited to socialize and explore KOACAccessibility considerationsThe tour part of this event is outdoors so please appropriately for the conditions, including wearing walking footwear (and being mindful of gopher holes!)Please bring sunscreen, insect repellent, water bottle and any other inclement weather gear, as required.Participants should be comfortable walking/standing for approximately one hour. There is a maintained outhouse on site.Kiyooka Ohe Arts CentreThe Kiyooka Ohe Arts Centre (KOAC) was founded by artists Harry Kiyooka and Katie Ohe, two visionary partners whose individual practices nurtured Alberta’s visual-arts landscape and community. Harry Kiyooka, a prolific painter and printmaker, and Katie Ohe, a powerhouse sculptor and printmaker, were both educators and mentors in their fields. Harry taught at the University of Calgary for over 30 years and helped initiate its MFA program, while Katie Ohe taught at the Alberta University of the Arts (then Alberta College of Art) for over 40 years, both achieving numerous accolades locally, nationally, and internationally. Harry Kiyooka and Katie Ohe consistently engaged in building appreciation for contemporary art in Calgary, and together they imagined a living studio and sculpture park being developed from their own Springbank home and studio, which would be dedicated to creativity, education, and contemplation of the connection between art and nature.The Kiyooka Ohe Arts Centre is now a year-round, sustainable, art-in-nature destination dedicated to research, exhibitions, education, and documentation of contemporary visual arts. Visitors experience large, medium and small-scale outdoor sculptures and site-specific commissions under the open sky, with the focus of the sculpture park’s distinguished permanent collection being Canadian and European modern sculpture, largely abstract works from the 1960s to the present.Image from KOAC with caption: Katie Ohe, Zig Zag, 2023, Photos by Mac Boyle

The Spade & The Soil

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The Spade & The Soil

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