Maria Michails, a multi-disciplinary artist and educator working in interactivity, installation, sculpture, video, and performance, will present SºOIL, a human-powered installation that examines the history of industrialization in relation to living systems. The installation will be powered by visitors’ participation, asking them to operate a handcar mechanism that produces electricity in order to allow plants to grow. Borrowing simultaneously from the Earth’s living systems and industrial processes, the installation is made up of mechanical, electronic and organic components that together create a space that is part laboratory, part farm, and part factory. Michails will be participating in an artist residency that will partner the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba with local agricultural and community organizations.