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The Arts Incubator

Winnipeg, Manitoba

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  • Sage Thrives in Land Lab
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Sage Thrives in Land Lab

This summer we're documenting garden and traditional plants while supporting community engagement on the land.
The Arts Incubator - Winnipeg June 24, 2025
The Land Lab's sustainable agriculture project expands this summer with the successful cultivation of traditional herbs like sage, enriching our storytelling initiative.

The Land Lab's sustainable agriculture project expands this summer with the successful cultivation of traditional herbs like sage, enriching our storytelling initiative.

Expanding Our Garden’s Story with Traditional and Healing Herbs

While we continue to nurture our fruits and berries as part of our community garden and storytelling project, this year we made a conscious effort to expand on herbs and spices. Sage, with its rich history and versatile uses, was naturally one of the main additions. It’s been amazing to watch these plants settle into our expanded grow boxes and plots, bringing another layer of sensory experience to our hands-on learning at the Land Lab.

This summer at the Land Lab, community members are diving into combining the arts with sustainable agriculture. Our focus isn’t just on what we grow, but the stories behind it – how these plants connect us to the land and to traditional knowledge. This year, we’re undertaking detailed plant documentation of a whole range of garden and traditional plants, including herbs like sage, understanding their roles and histories. This work builds beautifully on last year’s pilot programming that was supported by Manitoba Agriculture and the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, allowing us to cultivate community relationships and nature connection. This ongoing garden expansion is key to our environmental education efforts.

The sage plants themselves are doing incredibly well. Their leaves have that distinctive bumpy texture and a beautiful, muted green colour that hints at their aromatic power. After a slow start, they’re growing stronger and bushy, clearly enjoying the sun and the care we’re giving them. This commitment is part of our broader urban farming initiatives.

Adding sage to our collection feels significant. It’s a plant often associated with healing, cleansing, and wisdom in many cultures, including Indigenous traditions. And in cultivating it, we’re not just adding another plant to our garden; we’re inviting conversations about its historical uses, its role in wellbeing, and its place in the diverse collection of plants that sustain us.

A Growing Canvas for Community Arts and Story

Beyond the tangible act of growing, the Land Lab supports our incubator program for creativity, deeply integrating with our media arts and storytelling initiatives. It’s a place where the rich narratives of the land become the subject. Through activities like oral history storytelling, we capture the diverse voices and traditional knowledge connected to these plants and this place. Artists engage in photography workshops, documenting the subtle beauty and growth cycles, turning everyday observations into compelling visual stories. This unique intersection of nature and creativity makes our Living Land Lab program one of the main hubs for our arts incubator program, supporting life long learning and creative expression.

About the Author

The Arts Incubator - Winnipeg

The Arts Incubator - Winnipeg

Administrator

The Arts Incubator - Winnipeg is a participatory arts collective and living lab, based in Winnipeg, Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario. It's a space where innovation and creativity thrive. It's latest iteration was launched in 2021 with funding and support from the Canada Council for the Arts Digital Greenhouse. Today, working with students and faculty from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, we fuse traditional and participatory media arts with artificial intelligence, music, storytelling and community-driven, land-based artist residencies to cultivate new voices and bold ideas. Whether through collaborative projects or immersive experiences, our small but vibrant community supports creators to explore, experiment, and connect. Join us at the intersection of artistry, technology, culture and community—where every moment is a new opportunity to create.

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MANITOBA ARTS PROGRAMS

This platform, our Winnipeg, Manitoba hub and programs have been made possible with support from the Manitoba Arts Council Indigenous 360 Program. We gratefully acknowledge their funding and support in making the work we do possible.

Manitoba Arts Council Indigenous 360 Program

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Arts Incubator was seeded and piloted with strategic arts innovation funding from the Canada Council for the Arts Digital Greenhouse. We thank them for their investment, supporting northern arts capacity building and bringing the arts to life.

Canada Council for the Arts Digital Greenhouse Logo

NORTHWESTERN ONTARIO ARTS PROGRAMS

This platform, our Northwestern Ontario hub and programs have been made possible with support from the Ontario Arts Council Multi and Inter-Arts Projects Program. We gratefully acknowledge their funding and support in making the work we do possible.

Ontario Arts Council Multi and Inter-Arts Projects Program
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