Il Sustainable Colour Lab dell’OCADU: un cambiamento di paradigma nell’arte, nell’istruzione e nell’ecologia
What if your art supplies didn’t rely on industry, but on nature and community? The OCAD University Sustainable Colour Lab (SCL) is challenging the art-school paradigm, teaching students and professionals how to move beyond the store-bought by making their own natural pigments, dyes, and materials. We go inside the lab to see how this revolutionary initiative is championing environmental responsibility, ethical practice, and the reclamation of material knowledge.
A tube of paint created from reclaimed pencil shavings.
Stepping into the Università OCAD Sustainable Colour Lab (SCL) in the summer of 2025 was like entering a new world in which art, environmental responsibility, and community engagement were inextricably bound. This groundbreaking initiative was founded in 2024 by three faculty members representing different departments at OCADU; Nicole Collins (Drawing and Painting), Lauchie Reid (Illustration), and Julia Rose Sutherland (Material Art and Design).
As an artist who has worked in various painting processes for over 20 years, I found their premise simple yet incredibly powerful: to empower artists and designers by demystifying the materials we use, fostering a sense of self-sufficiency in creating our own materials, and promoting practices that are truly kind to our planet. Visiting during the very first summer residency, I was fortunate to speak with the founders, other participants, and to see, in action, the SCL’s commitment to advancing education in art and ecology.
Nicole Collins, a long time professor of Material Practices shared the inspiration behind the founding of the SCL. Material Practice is a course that Nicole has taught at OCADU over the last two decades. In this course, students are taught about foundational materials like different substrates, colour development, how materials interact with each other, and even how to make their own materials from scratch.
Students from Nicole’s courses on this subject consistently highlighted the curriculum’s importance to their practice, particularly in learning “alternative ways of making things–alternative to going to the art supply store and purchasing materials and then using them without context.” Understanding the value students found in this curriculum, and noting the class size limitations only being able to serve 40-60 students annually, Nicole started to envision how the skills and values of her course could be expanded to support the larger artistic community.
This led to the idea evolving into a research space, which would through its mandate celebrate both the academic as well as the material research that artists undertake to develop their practice. Nicole spoke about the tendency in academic circles to devalue material or studio based research stating that “all that labor that gets done [in the studio] before you can even start making the finished artwork is invisible and not recognized and, on some levels, not appreciated.” The core of this idea bloomed and eventually became one of the focuses of Collins’ sabbatical in 2023-2024, where she developed the lab’s framework and connected with Lauchie Reid and Julia Rose Sutherland, leading to the SCL’s launch in September 2024.
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Empowerment and Agency Through Art Materials
“Giving people the opportunity to think critically about what they want to make and the material they want to make their work with is kind of awesome. It’s empowering to people who otherwise have a limited exposure to the world of materials.” - Lauchie Reid, SCL Co-Founder
At its core, and what resonated deeply with me, is the SCL’s mission to disrupt the art school paradigm by providing students, alumni, and faculty with resourcing to become an active participant and reclaim ownership over the end-to-end production of their work. This isn’t just a statement; it’s a living philosophy evident in the work created by the summer resident participants.
Their workspace felt like a hybrid studio and chemistry laboratory where hotplates heated bubbling mixtures, glass beakers defused materials, and a huge diversity of art production was underway. I immediately felt the emphasis on empowerment and agency. It’s not just about learning techniques; it’s about gaining a profound understanding and control over every step of the artistic process, from the raw materials to the finished piece. As a practicing artist,the idea of having full ownership over my work and knowing exactly what goes into it, is a truly liberating concept.
Ethical Art Practices: Sourcing Natural Pigments and Recycled Materials
“Many of the colors that have been worked on over the past week in the SCL are literally things that have been scavenged. People are walking in with a grocery bag full of flower buds, or old coffee grounds, and asking if they can be turned into paint. And our answer is ‘let’s figure it out’.” - Julia Rose Sutherland, SCL Co-Founder
The SCL champions environmental responsibility and ethical material sourcing. The lab actively encourages participants to recycle materials from one’s everyday environment, using native plants and organics to produce pigment, dyes, and more.This hands-on, experimental approach made me consider the ecological footprint of my own art practice, and no doubt the artists participating in the residency take away the same awareness
The skills honed through SCL are a refreshing shift away from relying on industrially produced materials that often carry a heavy environmental cost. I also love the ideas presented through the SCL structure of a more balanced financial ecology in art making. With the costs of art materials steadily rising, it can be a tough investment for art students to explore new materials. It was wonderful to see that students and professional artists alike were exposed to a new world of art making from the things around them, even materials that would otherwise be considered “garbage” and at little to no cost.
On the day of my visit, a group of participants were making their own crayons and drawing sticks by mixing beeswax with pigments made from a variety of sources like: charcoal from a campfire, used coffee grounds, the powdered distillations of dandelions, and even vibrant red crayons made from beetles. Where the materials one purchases from the art supply store are derived from exotic and faraway pigment sources and then shipped from overseas, the materials used at the SCL were all locally sourced, recycled, or otherwise reduced the ecological impacts of the supply chain of art materials.
Bridging Art Research and Studio Practice
“I’ve found myself actively involved in every step of the making process, from foraging materials to grinding pigments and creating new artworks.” - Julia Rose Sutherland, SCL Co-Founder in
Space and time are so often the critical factors in art making. When developing the concept for SCL, it was important for the founders to not just have a space for the production of pigments and other materials, but also studio space so that artists could freely experiment with the materials they produced in the lab. In this way, SCL truly grounds the totality of the art making process—from material sourcing, to pigment creation, to studio experimentation, to art work development, and even presentation.
This hands-on experience is invaluable for developing a holistic understanding of materials and their environmental impact. The three co-founders all emphasized their vision of making the residency a space for experimental work not just in the processing of materials, but the full spectrum of the art making process. It is a unique aspect of SCL as a research project to have studio space and ensure that art production is a central part of the research output. While there have been trends in academic spheres in recent years on organic pigment production, this has often been in isolation from art making.
“If you make the materials, the work is going to be affected by the materials that you made. It’s critical that artists understand that their research doesn’t stop in the lab. The act of making art is research as well.” – Nicole Collins, SCL Co-Founder
The SCL is actively calling into question the way that people have been taught to handle materials. Lauchie Reid observed that “we have a generation of painters who never learned the technical aspects of painting.” In an age where de-skilling is often seen as a stylistic choice, and academic focus is frequently on the conceptual framework around one’s practice, concepts of materials and technical skill building around art making have gone by the wayside.
The lab is reintroducing the vital importance of craft and material knowledge, pushing back against what Reid jokingly referred to as the “classist idea that knowing how to make something with your hands is dated [and working to] make knowing how to produce things cool for students again,” the SCL bridges the gap between conceptual art and the tangible realities of material production. It’s about a more complete artistic education and underscores its role in carving out a new space for this kind of learning within academia.
Reclamation of Lost Knowledge and Traditional Practices
Julia Rose, who is an indigenous educator, also spoke about how SCL touches on current trends she sees within the Indigenous art community around the reclamation of lost knowledge and traditional practices. The lab is actively working to recover lost knowledge about pigments and to create a base of knowledge that is more culturally sustainable. Julia Rose, with her background in material design and Indigenous visual culture, pointed out that many of her students are naturally drawn to analogue, or handmade, processes.
For many, she explained, it’s “part of most of their pedagogy, in their worldview…they are moving away from screens.” She even shared a personal story about her great-aunt teaching her to dye quills, highlighting the “onus on me to go back to the natural world and figure out how to do this without synthetic dyes,” underscoring the importance of intergenerational knowledge and the revitalization of sustainable practices that, sadly, have been pushed aside by modern industrialization. Being part of this reclamation feels like SCL connecting with a deeper, richer, and intersectional artistic heritage, with a focus on, as Julia Rose puts it “Sustaining our hearts, our culture, our knowledge.”
Julia Rose’s observations about students yearning to be away from technology and connecting with traditional material practices really resonated with me as an artist, former student, teacher, and parent. This holistic view of sustainability recognizes the interconnectedness of ecological, cultural, and personal well-being. Nicole also discussed the evolution of her own “materially mindful” practice, noting that “the choices that I would have made back [when she began her career] are different than the choices I would make now. The world has literally changed… Sustainable practice, as a practitioner, is also about figuring out how to slow down, figuring out how to carve time out of the other things that you have to do.”
Cultivating Community and a “Gift Economy” of Materials
“Sustainability is so frequently attached purely to the environment, but I think there are a lot of different types of sustainability that we need to think about–making and sustaining a community is huge.” - Lauchie Reid, SCL Co-Founder
The sense of community, sharing, and collective excitement were palpable at the summer residency. Nothing underscored this for me more than the lab’s “gift economy.” A system in which artists can swap inks and materials, mirroring the kind of sharing and exchange seen in gardening. Julia Rose explains it “sometimes you produce a lot of one kind of pigment so sharing and exchanging with others means that you collectively work together to build a material base.”
This collaborative environment, where participants share resources and learn from each other, felt like a powerful antidote to the often isolated nature of artistic practice. It’s a space where collective learning and shared passion thrive. Nicole also mentioned that a “big component of the lab, maybe one of the most important components, is the development and growing of a community of researchers together from across all kinds of platforms and practices.” She likes to frame it as a “community bartering system of exchange,” rather than a space focused solely on production.
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The SCL: A Hub for Critical Inquiry in Art and Ecology
The OCADU Sustainable Colour Lab is far more than a place to make pigments. It’s a vibrant hub for critical inquiry, ecological awareness, and artistic innovation. By prioritizing hands-on learning, fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, and challenging conventional notions of art education, the SCL is shaping and supporting a new generation of artists and designers who are deeply connected to their materials and the environment.
Its mission to reclaim lost knowledge, promote ethical practices, and build a strong community of makers offers a compelling working model for continuing education in art and ecology. A model that demonstrates that creativity flourishes when intertwined with responsibility and a profound understanding of the world around us. The impact of the SCL extends beyond the university walls, inspiring a broader “return to materiality” and a more sustainable, thoughtful approach to artistic practice.
To learn more about the Sustainable Colour Lab, its practices and future events and residencies, visit their Format Website and join their mailing list.
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