What happened?

After an exhibition opening on Friday, July 5, 2024, several businesses in Riversdale had their windows smashed. The AKA Artist-Run and PAVED Arts Window Gallery was broken for the third time since its installation. With each incident we are confronted with costly repairs and difficult scheduling that precipitates prolonged periods of closure.

It has been important to both organizations to provide a 24/7 street-facing presentation space for our artists and attendees. Donations and community support make a huge difference for artist-run centres and we are calling on your help to get the window gallery back in working order. We appreciate your support and patience as we make these repairs. 

History of the Window Gallery

After re-opening our doors to the community following a long and trying period of pandemic restrictions, we quickly realized that we were coming back to a very different world in a number of ways. Emerging from this time, we envisioned a new way to serve the public and make a gallery space more front-facing to the neighbourhood. This was the purpose of the Window Gallery. 

Since 2022, PAVED Arts and AKA Artist-Run have presented a number of works within this public-facing window gallery. The new venue increases the number of shared programmable spaces and compliments the already established Main Gallery, Media gallery, studios spaces and outdoor billboard space. Since the Fall of 2022, AKA and PAVED Arts have exhibited and paid professional fees to over 25 artists in the window gallery. Each project has an estimated viewership of 5000 people. Undertaken with support from Canadian Heritage, the Window Gallery addresses a long-desired opening to the facade of our building, as well as 24/7 exposure for art projects on one of the busiest streets in Saskatoon.

How you can help

After posting a story about this on Facebook we received a number of responses and donations from our supporters to cover the costs of the window repair and additional glass protection to help prevent this from happening so frequently.

If you’d like to support the repair of AKA and PAVED’s public-facing presentation spaces we sincerely thank you for your donations.

Any amount helps! 

To further incentivize your support, with any donation of $50 dollars or more, we invite you to come down to the centre to redeem complimentary memberships from PAVED Arts and AKA Artist-Run.

Fundraising Goals

🪟 Goal 1: Repair Window Panes

Amount: $2,500

Status: 🎉 Complete!!! 🎉 We are looking forward to getting the panes installed in September and showcasing more art in the window gallery ASAP! Our sincere thanks to our community for making that possible!

🛡️ Goal 2: Install shutters for protection on evenings, weekends, and between exhibitions

Amount: $2,800

Status: $1,255 raised

💎 Goal 3: Install Rock Glass

Amount: $7,000

Status: This is a long-term dream for us so that we could keep the window gallery open 24/7 for anyone walking by our building on 20th!