Last summer, the Blackwood Gallery presented its first ever off-site exhibition. Titled The Projects: Port Credit, it presented creative stagings and reflections on the myriad futures to be imagined in Port Credit, Mississauga. The second edition of The Projects: Port Credit builds on the first by moving from an empty architect's office to a condo showroom. From an empty shell where plans are no longer conceived to an overdetermined space where plans are foregone conclusions. The ten invited artists participating in The Projects insinuate themselves in the showroom and in the surroundings of the building in ways ranging from anodyne to grating. But to intertwine remains the shared modus operandi. In other words, they favor understatement, they poke cunningly rather than crudely. The ten projects presented do not point in a single direction, they each propose idiosyncratic paths and develop unique slants. Some of the areas under scrutiny are commuter trains, bicycle routes, commemorative displays, architectural models, resonant frequencies, water parks, public sculpture, vanishing chairs, descriptive language, and graffiti on glass. Throughout, there is a clear intent and conviction that contemporary art in Port Credit has a place in the daily fabric of the community. Imagine, if you will, a cultural boom to accompany the construction boom. Imagine this formidable pair, yes, but let's also act on its translation to realization. In this context, The Projects might function like a timely prod, an inciting nudge, a flash forward in that direction.

—Christof Migone, Director/Curator, Blackwood Gallery