Cassandra Kerwin, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

cassandra@qctonline.com

Teenagers’ minds are full of wonder. Even though they might appear to be lazing around, their minds are active, creative and inventive, as demonstrated in the latest exhibit at the Musée de la Civilisation (MCQ), Teens: Creative Minds. Within the 170 square metres, 11 Canadian teens and their creations are showcased to educate and inspire future inventors.

The source of this exhibit sprouted from one of Quebec’s most innovative and renowned inventors, Joseph-Armand Bombardier, who, at the age of 15 in 1922, built the prototype of what would become the snowmobile. “We wondered how adolescence is creative. [Looking at Bombardier], we wondered why he is so creative and what drove him to be so,” said Antoine Laprade, manager of exhibits at the Musée de l’ingéniosité J. Armand Bombardier (MIJAB) in Valcourt.

To celebrate the 100th anniversary of this invention, the MIJAB created this exhibit in collaboration with the Université de Sherbrooke by researching other ingenious Canadian teens. Visitors will discover 11 young Canadian inventors and their inventions, from the airless baby bottles created by Jean Saint- Germain, then 16, in 1953, to the QualyL, the robotic heart adaptable to patients’ efforts devised by Jonathan Lévesque, then 17, in 2018, to other innovations such as self-heating ski poles. The MCQ even invites visitors to test some of these inventions. The exhibit also takes a closer look at how teenagers’ brains work. At the heart of Teens: Creative Minds stands a giant structure representing the shape of the brain. Stepping into it, visitors will discover the parts of this vital organ and learn how it keeps developing right through adolescence up to around age 25, despite reaching its full size by the time a child turns six.

“By presenting this exhibition, we wanted to reach and engage an audience that is dear to us: teenagers,” said MCQ general director Julie Lemieux. “We wanted to offer a space where their dynamism and ideas take on their full dimension. It also allows us to discover unsuspected inventions, purely from our region, to which we had not previously paid attention.”Until Sept. 1, the MCQ invites the public to discover and even test these inventions.

For more information, visit mcq.org/en/discover/exhibitions/ados-cerveaux-inventifs.