Sheridan students and alumni spreading holiday cheer at Mississauga Festival of Trees

Working for approximately 100 hours on an exhibit for the upcoming Mississauga Festival of Trees has brought four second-year Visual Merchandising Design (VMD) students — each of them from a different country — closer together.

They hope their installation has a similar effect on anyone who sees it during the holiday season.

"Our project is rooted in diversity and unity," Thamini Pitchaimani says of 'Jenga Roots', an abstract tree composed of 23 large wooden blocks that resemble pieces from the Jenga tower-building game. "Each block has to work together for the structure to stand."

The VMD student project is one of three installations with Sheridan roots at this year’s Mississauga Festival of Trees, a celebration of winter, art and food taking place Dec. 6-15 at the Small Arms Inspection Building (SAIB), 3152 Lakeshore Road East, Mississauga.

Zach Wallace (Welding Techniques ’16), whose first welding sculptures were created in Sheridan’s Magna Skilled Trades Centre shops using off-cuts from class projects, is building a rustic Christmas tree out of hundreds of three-inch triangles notched from scrap materials. Meanwhile, long-time Mississauga St. Joan of Arc Catholic Secondary School visual arts teacher Mina Vancardo (Art and Art History ’99) is assembling a display of vintage birdcages containing various holiday scenes.

Visual Merchandising Design students

‘Jenga Roots’ features 11 red oak blocks (47.5” x 15.75” x 15.75") stacked atop each other to form the tree’s trunk, with the remaining 12 blocks suspended from the SAIB ceiling to form branches. All of the blocks are inscribed with positive messages in various languages, representing the cultural diversity of the group members: Pitchaimani (India), Estrella Velasquez (Peru), Zowie Nguyen (Vietnam) and Sheng-Wen Hsiao (Taiwan.)

While the project reinforces various concepts and techniques taught in Sheridan’s VMD program — including captivating installation design and sustainable fabrication methods — it is extra-curricular and completed outside of class time. Students can apply hours spent on the project towards the program's placement requirement.

"We are taking ownership for everything, from budgeting to sourcing materials to negotiating with vendors to fabrication," Pitchaimani says. "It's also exposed us to working with various tools in the wood shop at Hazel McCallion Campus, such as track saws and CNC routers. It's been challenging, but our program technologist Scott Rogers has supported us a lot."

This is the third time in four years that a group of Sheridan VMD students is creating an installation for the Mississauga Festival of Trees. Previous student installations included 2021’s ‘Diversi(tree)’, largely made of knitted clothing (pictured below, left), and last year’s ‘A Beacon of Light and a Wandering Wish’, featuring cultural-patterned ribbons and lanterns (below, right.)

Zach Wallace

Wallace came up for the idea for a metal tree while welding together triangles to create a carbon 60 molecule exhibit recently for Hamilton's Back Alley Gallery. Although his art is typically informed by materials he finds to work with, he also enjoys calling attention to the parallels between things created in the wild and things created by humans.

"Honey is considered natural, but it is manufactured by bees through complicated processes. I don't see how most things created by people are that different," says Wallace, who hopes to eventually make sculpting a full-time venture. "I want people to feel whatever they might feel when seeing this tree and to see the aesthetic beauty inherent in the form, but to also recognize that anything we make is natural too. The patterns of nature inform the patterns of everything we make."

All of the materials used in Wallace’s sculptures are scraps from his employer, Mississauga-based stainless steel fabrication company Complete Stainless.

Mina Vancardo

Vancardo always knew she wanted to be a teacher, but she discovered her passion for art when she took introductory painting and art history courses in her first year at Sheridan. She's dabbled in various mediums ever since, largely because of the different interests of her high school students but also due to an eagerness to try new things.

'Festive Narratives' is one of her first forays into assemblage sculpture, which she describes as a three-dimensional version of collage art. The installation will feature open birdcages containing various holiday-related scenes, surrounded on the outside by greenery and cardinals.

"My intention is to provide a peek into somebody else's life and demonstrate that we all celebrate differently. It's not always what you see on TV with the big holiday parties or everyone gathered around a large table eating," Vancardo says. "Some people spend the holidays alone, happy among their plants or with their vacuum cleaner collection. But everybody does something during the holiday season that is special to them."

Presented by Mississauga non-profit CreativeHub 1352, the Mississauga Festival of Trees also includes a holiday market featuring artisan and culinary vendors, holiday light displays, hands-on workshops and live performances by local talent. A full calendar of events can be found on the Mississauga Festival of Trees webpage. Admission fees are pay-as-you-can.

Learn more about Sheridan's Visual Merchandising Design, Welding Techniques and Art and Art History (joint degree with the University of Toronto) programs.