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Pilot Project: A community-engaged session for artist-parents, held in connection with the Tracing Days exhibition, featuring concurrent activity stations for children and an accompanying resource sheet. Developed in partnership with Shea Proulx and Gallery@501.

Project Duration: October 2024 – April 2025

Continuing to Implement: Yes, continuing to develop the resource sheet and seeking funding to offer more sessions and supports.

Resources Shared: Project Field Notes, Promotional Poster, Web Announcement, Artist-Parent/Carer Resource Sheet

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About Jennifer Long

Location: Ontario
Artistic Discipline: Visual Art
Operating Budget: Project-based

Jennifer Long’s art practice focuses on themes of connection, transformation, and community. Over the past fifteen years, her imagery has focused on the shifting stages of mothering as she navigates this terrain in her life. Long has received funding from municipal, provincial, and federal arts councils and has been exhibited and published internationally.

About Collaborator Shea Proulx

Location: Alberta
Artistic Discipline: Visual Art
Operating Budget: Project-based

Shea Proulx constructs autobiographical visual narratives that transcend the boundaries of individual lived experience. Proulx has exhibited across Canada, is the recipient of municipal, provincial and federal arts funding and teaches Continuing Education at AuArts. She has published four books and is editing an anthology launching in 2025.

Level UP! Project Details

Jennifer Long’s project was in collaboration with artist Shea Proulx and Gallery@501 in Sherwood Park, Alberta. The initiative centred on Sustaining & Growing: Artist-Parents in Conversation—a relaxed, child-inclusive community engagement session designed to explore sustainable creative strategies for artist-parents and caregivers. The event ran alongside the exhibition Tracing Days, which featured work by Long (photography) and Proulx (painting/illustration), and integrated “creativity stations” for all ages to engage with while in the art space. An eight-page resource sheet for artist-parents was also developed, compiled from community input and independent research. The project aimed to foster inclusive, welcoming gallery environments while building networks of support for artists balancing caregiving and creative work.

Project Highlights:

• • Created a relaxed event space by using inclusive, welcoming language and providing interactive art stations to engage children.
  • Produced a resource guide created by and for artist-parents/caregivers, distributed during the event and shared widely post-project.
  • Partnered with Gallery@501, leveraged artist networks, and collaborated with the local library to expand event promotion and audience reach.