The Outset Partners Awards Programme 2024 awarded a Transformative Award to Lassonde Art Trail Foundation. ‘Deep Site’ will interrogate a complex site for future public art by exploring its ecosystems and microhabitats, biomimicry, and sustainable futures. Structured as a cross-disciplinary think tank and production laboratory, ‘Deep Site’ embeds artistic and scientific exchange at the heart of a new public art organisation. The ‘Deep Site’ program will be one of the inaugural projects of the Lassonde Art Trail (LAT), a free, open-air destination for outstanding contemporary art from around the world opening in 2026. Situated on the extraordinary site of a new island in the Toronto harbour archipelago, LAT believes public art enhances wellbeing, guides respectful dialogue, and opens our eyes to how we steward the environment.
Chloë Catán, Executive Director of LAT said:
‘We are thrilled to be a recipient of this year’s Outset Transformative Grant. As a new organization aiming to stimulate innovative thinking around site-responsive public art, this vital support will fund a program that focuses on deep site research and cross-disciplinary collaborations. At the core, this grant provides a unique opportunity to bring artists and scientists together at the very moment of a site’s emergence and in the early stages of its public art program, allowing us to bridge knowledge and ways of working that will catalyze transformative public art programming.‘
