The Grantham Foundation for the Art and the Environment is pleased to announce its winners in creation and in research of its 2025 Call for Projects.

Creation Award — seth cardinal dodginghorse

seth cardinal dodginghorse is a multidisciplinary artist, Prairie Chicken Dancer, experimental musician and cultural researcher. They grew up eating dirt and exploring the forest on their family’s ancestral land on the Tsuut’ina Nation. In 2014 their family was forcibly removed from their homes and land for the construction of the Southwest Calgary Ring Road. This life changing event has been the focus of their creative work. seth currently records and releases music as lawrence teeth, they are also a part of the Sobey Art Award nominated collective tīná gúyáńí (Deer Road) with their mother Glenna Cardinal.

During their residency they will research and create a new site-specific sound composition/performance that explores the question “what does the land have to say?”. This work will be directly inspired by the land and environment in which the Foundation is located. They will perform sound to the land everyday, both indoors and outdoors using their guitar, voice, and gathered field recordings while in residence. In their traditional cultures they have everyday practices that involve them connecting with the land they are on.

To learn more about the artistic practice of seth cardinal dodginghorse: https://www.sethcardinaldodginghorse.com/

Research Award — Laure Bourgault & Fred Schmidt-Arenales

Laure Bourgault is an artist and doctoral student in geography at the Université de Genève and in art history at the Université du Québec à Montréal. Her work focuses on energy infrastructures, institutional archives and the role of images in collective organization processes.

Fred Schmidt-Arenales is an artist and filmmaker. His projects attempt to bring awareness to unconscious processes on the individual and group level. He has presented films, installations, and performances internationally. His film Committee of Six was awarded a Jury Prize for Best of the Festival at the 2023 Onion City Experimental Film Festival.

For their part, Bourgault & Fred Schmidt-Arenales will initiate research around an experimental film project that explores the challenges of energy decarbonization within a fictional rural community affected by a green energy development project. During their residency in Grantham, the duo will imagine and organize a series of workshops with people living in places affected by green energy development projects. These workshops will experiment with the form of role-playing and serve as a reference for script writing.

To learn more about the artistic practice of Laure Bourgault: https://laurebourgault.com/

To learn more about the artistic practice of Fred Schmidt-Arenales: https://fredschmidt-arenales.net/