Reconnaissance, Heart + Soul: the Windsor Armouries

The Hamilton Perambulatory Unit and the IN/TERMINUS Research Group will celebrate the opening of our new SoCA downtown campus with a participatory “strata-walk,” investigating forms of military urbanism, old and new.  This walk is both a reconnaissance into the the historical military foundation of the city, and an attempt to track the current location of its “heart and soul.” Downtowns were once called the “heart” or “soul” of a city, a metaphor that lends emotional weight to the multi-layered and densely populated regions that once defined city life. For most of the 20th century, the Windsor Armouries were at the civic centre, providing a form of fortification and security that is now changing.  We will investigate how has security changed from the early 20th century and ways in which is displayed or hidden in our urban landscape. This walk is presented in conjunction with the Art Gallery of Windsor for the 2017 Windsor Triennial Exhibition, Downtown/s: Urban Renewal Today for Tomorrow (on display at AGW Oct. 20, 2017 - Jan 28, 2018)