Industry leaders weighed in on Calgary's creative future at Calgary Economic Development's Uplook LIVE: Building the Future of Calgary’s Creative Economy on Nov. 27 at Studio Bell. A replay of the full event is available on our YouTube channel.
Artificial intelligence and other emerging trends are transforming Calgary’s creative industries, from digital media to film, and shaping how the city drives innovation and economic growth.
Creative leaders convened in front of a crowd of industry professionals at Studio Bell on Nov. 27 for Uplook LIVE: Building the Future of Calgary’s Creative Economy. Speakers emphasized that the Blue Sky City has strong potential to harness the power of creativity and put new technology to use to drive innovation, attract talent and diversify the local economy.
“Calgary's creative economy is a cornerstone of our city's success — fueling innovation, attracting top talent and fostering collaboration,” Geri Anderson, Vice President of External Affairs at Calgary Economic Development (CED), told the crowd.
“By investing in these sectors, we unlock opportunities that enrich Calgary's cultural and economic landscape.”
As Calgary looks to the future, it’s not just about reacting to trends; it’s about moulding them. Uplook, Calgary’s economic action plan and the namesake of our Uplook LIVE event series, is a visionary blueprint guiding the city’s economy toward a vibrant and diversified future.
A vision of the future
To build a resilient creative economy in Calgary, CED is scanning global trends and imaging the possibilities in the sector 10, 20, 50 and 100 years from now.
Rachelle Bugeaud, CED’s foresight manager, provided a crash course on the power of foresight in shaping Calgary’s creative trajectory, and how CED leverages this information to prepare the city for possibilities decades into the future.
“Foresight, in a nutshell, is essentially about looking at the ways in which the world is changing, in order to anticipate what it might mean for the future. We can imagine better alternatives and design strategies or actions so that we can meet and build the future today,” said Bugeaud.
Bugeaud explored the sweeping impact of emerging tools like artificial intelligence and the ways they’ll affect how we make and consume creative works in the coming years and decades.
Transformative shifts are in store, not just for Calgary’s creative community, but worldwide, she said. These shifts include the adoption of synthetic cultural influencers, monetization of likeness, personalized entertainment and media experiences, growth of virtual goods and services, augmentation of reality into new realms and the development of immersive creations.
Bugeaud challenged the audience to envision how new tech will blend with traditional mediums — sparking either a creative renaissance or a mass disruption.
“The truth is, there is a lot changing — not only the technology, but also how we are consuming the media, who's producing it, the quality of the media,” she said.
“We're looking not only at the technological changes, but also societal changes, demographics and economic changes.”
‘Already starting to happen’
The conversation shifted to a panel discussion with industry luminaries Hasmi Ferguson, Co-founder of animation studio Stellar Creative Lab; Tasneem Rahim, Vice President External at Bow Valley College; and Alex Sarian, President and CEO of Arts Commons, who explored the opportunities and obstacles facing Calgary's creative ecosystem.
Top of mind for the panelists was Bugeaud’s presentation and the real implications it outlined.
"All of the things that Rachelle mentioned, for us, are already starting to happen,” said Ferguson.
Ferguson said it’s important to utilize new tools as they become available, noting that her studio is creating its own AI application to enhance the creative process.
“Creativity is only limited by the tools you have,” she said.
“For us, creating these AI tools, creating apps, none of it is with the idea to replace anyone. The idea is that you can do new creative work with it; that’s what’s exciting to us.”
Acknowledging the historical pattern of fear surrounding technological advancements in the arts, Sarian — formerly a senior executive at New York’s Lincoln Center and recent author of The Audacity of Relevance: Critical Conversations on the Future of Arts and Culture — argued that such reactions are often unfounded.
Now leading Calgary’s $660 million Arts Commons Transformation project, the largest cultural infrastructure project in Canadian history, Sarian emphasized that increasing access to digital creative products fuels demand for more shared, social experiences.
“I mean, the television was supposed to be the death of the live arts,” he said.
“With the introduction of new technology or new tools, I think our fear, collectively, is that it will happen at the expense of something else.
“The tools are evolving, but what we do with the tools is completely up to us, and the fear of these tools ... are always countered and met with an evolution of people still wanting to gather.”
Rahim discussed Bow Valley College’s efforts to future-proof the creative workforce through adaptive programming and collaborative partnerships that prepare students with the creative tools used in industry today. She underscored the importance of providing students with the skills and experiences they need to thrive in the rapidly evolving creative sector.
"It's all based on industry need. It's not us saying ‘This is what's important,’ it's industry saying ‘This is what we need,’” she said. Acknowledging the college’s constant conversations with industry about in-demand skills, she added, “We'll even help you develop that curriculum."
Rahim went on to explain Bow Valley College's approach, which includes developing dual credit programs to attract high school students and offering micro-credentials to allow for flexible, industry-driven upskilling.
This collaborative, responsive approach, Rahim says, will ensure the college can better equip the next generation of creative professionals with the skills they need to succeed in Calgary's growing creative economy.
Our economic blueprint
As the titular event of Calgary's economic action plan, Uplook LIVE is an opportunity for Calgarians to learn more about the city’s mission to encourage diversification and build economic resiliency.
“Every civic organization, community organization, small and large enterprise in Calgary plays a role in advancing this plan and shaping the economic future of our city — and all of you here today are testament to this,” said Anderson.
"Calgary has become a city where startups can scale, multinational companies expand, and a skilled workforce is prepared for the jobs of tomorrow."
Learn more about the vision for Calgary’s economic future, Uplook, here, and explore the possibilities of the Blue Sky City’s creative industries.
Photos by: Neil Zeller