Pillow Fight at Nathan Phillips Square
in celebration of International Pillow Fight Day 2016
#pillowfight | #pillowfighttoronto
Posts Tagged ‘images’
pillow fight!
Posted: April 4, 2016 in events, peopleTags: cameras, crowd, dodging, fun, hitting, images, kids, laughing, men, nathan phillips square, outdoors, outside, people, photographers, pictures, pillow fight, spectators, throwing, women
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in-between at Ontario Square
Posted: November 11, 2015 in public artTags: animals, art, black bird, costumes, Harbourfront, hobby horses, horses, images, imagination, in between worlds, Meryl McMaster, Ontario Square, outdoors, photographs, public art, Queens Quay West, questions, role play, winter
‘In-Between Worlds’ is a series of photographs by Canadian photographer Meryl McMaster. This series centres around the role of McMaster’s dual heritage in her search for self; The images represent her being part of, and also being between, two different cultures as she is part Cree and part ‘European’.
Three of the images are on display at Ontario Square by Queens Quay West and Lower Simcoe St.
below: Horse Dance. The bright red and blue of the shaggy hobby horses against a winter landscape makes for an eye catching picture. On closer look, you realize that there is a person’s head inside one of those horses’s head. Heads that have no eyes to see or mouths to speak.
below: Wingeds Calling. Around the corner there is another picture of a person in costume, playing the role of a real, yet not real, animal. A large black bird-like figure walks on the frozen ground, perhaps too big and awkward to fly.
below: Wind Play Variation. The third picture baffles me a bit. Although this is another picture of a person assuming a role, this time the creature is totally of the artist’s imagination. A blue hairy thing that is slightly blurry as it walks amongst the pine trees. Is it coming or going?
58th World Press Photo Contest
Posted: October 3, 2015 in events, galleriesTags: Allan Lambert gallery, Brookfield Place, China, contemporary issues, football, images, people, photographers, photography, pictures, portraits, sports, world press
At Allan Lambert Gallery, Brookfield Place,
winning photos from the 58th World Press Photo Contest
Winning images chosen from 97,912 photographs taken by 5,692 photographers from 131 countries.
below: Taken by Andy Rocchelli of Italy, part of his series of ‘Russian Interiors’ portraits. There were 10 photographs in the series, three of which are shown here (well, two and a half). All were of women.
below: One of the multitude of Chinese migrant laborers, a factory worker in in Yiwu China. His job is to coat polystyrene snowflakes with red powder. There are 600 factories in Yiwu and they produce 60% of the world’s Christmas decorations. Photo by Ronghui Chen, second prize winner in the Contemporary Issues category.
below: The three winning photographs from the Sports (Singles) category. The predominant photo is the second prize photo; it is a photo of Odell Beckham of the New York Giants making a one handed touchdown catch, taken by Al Bello. The winning sports photo is the one on the far left. It is a photo of Argentine football player Lionel Messi receiving the Golden Ball trophy at the World Cup in Brazil, taken by Bao Tailiang. In the middle is a picture of Philip Hughes, a cricket batsman who was hit on the head by a ball during a game, taken by Mark Metcalfe.
below: The winning photo, by Danish photographer, Mads Nissen of Jon and Alex, a gay couple, sharing an intimate moment at Alex’s home, a small apartment in St Petersburg, Russia. (It looks better in real life!)
banners on Queens Quay
Posted: September 18, 2015 in public artTags: banners, contest, downtown, finalists, harbour, images, Lake Ontario, Lakeshore, outdoor photo exhibit, photography, photos, poles, Queens Quay, skyline, street scene, Toronto, traffic, waterfront, Waterfront BIA
Waterfront Outdoor Photo Exhibit
For the past four years, the Waterfront BIA has organized a photography contest. East year fifty finalists are chosen. This year they have organized a photo exhibit of a different kind. One hundred and fourteen images were chosen from the 200 finalists from their previous photo contests. These images were used (and cropped!) to make vertical banners, 5 ft x 2 ft in size. The banners are made of vinyl and the same image is on both sides.
below: You can see many of the banners on Queen’s Quay between Yonge and Bathurst.
below: Sometimes it’s difficult to see the banners amongst all the other things along Queen’s Quay
below: There are also some banners on Lakeshore Blvd between Bathurst and Spadina.
art and fashion on Dundas
Posted: August 13, 2015 in public artTags: construction, digital, digital art, digital painting, DPXA, Dundas St., Extended animation, fashion, hoardings, images, OCAD, pictures, sidewalk, TTC
“Art Loves Fashion! Fashion Loves Art!”
Retailer H&M is presently renovating the southwest corner of Yonge & Dundas. On the Dundas St. side of the development, the hoardings have provided a space for an art exhibit. It is an outdoor digital gallery of images produced by students in OCAD’s Digital Painting/Expanded Animation (DPXA) program.
below: ‘Nude Collage’ by Arshia Salesi
below: Resting against ‘Indeterminate Peony’ by Trudy Erin Elmore.
To the left is ‘Nonscape V’ by Monica Moraru
below: A woman walks past ‘Streetcar Style’ by Avery Kua.
below: ‘Blocked!’ by Ghazaleh Baniahmad
below: ‘Ascend’ by Niya Vaillancourt
below: ‘The New Patronage’ by Cat Bluemke
below: Sign making below ‘ Cloth and Jewels’ by Samet Choudhury
Rubiks cubes and crayons
Posted: August 6, 2015 in galleriesTags: albums, art exp gallery, collage, crayons, cubeworks, Distillery District, gun, images, love, Michaelangelo, pictures, pixelated, pixels, pop art, pop culture, records, rubiks cubes, space invaders, thread, vinyl
The art of CubeWorks
now showing at Art/Exp gallery in the Distillery District
CubeWorks is a group of artists that use unconventional materials to create images. They are known for the art that they create using Rubik’s cubes but they also use crayons, lego blocks, records, dice, guitar picks, spools of thread, and other mixed media. The pictures below are just a sample.
below: A copy of ‘The Creation of Adam’ that Michaelangelo painted on the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel ceiling in the early 1500’s. This image is made with 12,090 hand twisted Rubik’s cubes.
below: On a smaller scale, Space Invaders made with 20 cubes.
below: Artworks made of crayons, LOVE and a smoking gun.
Each square is 12″ x 12″ and contains just over 1000 crayons.
below: The Joker’s face, made with spools of thread, hangs from the ceiling.
below: Images made with old broken record albums, Amy Winehouse and Jim Morrison
billboards at Spadina and Front
Posted: June 8, 2015 in general TorontoTags: art, billboards, bread, CONTACT, cucumber, handbag, images, parking lot, photography, rubber gloves, Spadina, sponges, Toronto
Part of CONTACT photography festival,
billboard “art” on the NE corner of Spadina and Front streets.
All the billboards are in a parking lot in what was a junky looking space to begin with.
below: Yellow rubber gloves with the fingers tucked back in…
to look like they’ve just been taken off a pair of hands?
below: The body of the handbag is a loaf of bread.
below: Clusters of sponges. At first I thought they were candies.
Supported by Pattison Outdoor Advertising and Nikon Canada.
“Challenging how people perceive and interact with images in public spaces”
“Each of the artists destabilizes the conventions of advertising and the cultural codes associated with consumer lifestyles.”
Me? I’ll call them dull and underwhelming clutter. Too harsh? Perhaps.
I’ll leave the verdict up to you.
from pork to park
Posted: August 9, 2014 in history, locationsTags: bee, butterflies, construction, corktown, corktown commons, DOn River, Gooderham & Worts, green trees, hogs, hogtown, images, map, park, pavillion, photos, plants, pork, Toronto, urban, West Don Lands, William Davies Co..
Corktown Common
One of Toronto’s newest parks
In one corner of the park there is a plaque that commemorates the William Davies Company, once the owners of the land and buildings in this part of the city.
“From 1874 to 1927, this site was home to the William Davies Company, reputed to be the largest pork packing plant in the British Empire. Established in 1857 by William Davies (1831-1921), the company made its fortune preparing and exporting cured sides of pork to England. Later, its products were sold through William Davies Company shops, one of Canada’s first store chains. In its buildings here, the innovative company controlled the entire process from slaughter to shipment. Processing nearly 500,000 hogs annually by 1900, the company contributed to the city’s nickname “Hogtown”.
In 1892, Joseph Flavelle (1858-1939) became a partner and managing director of the company. Under Flavelle, the business flourished until the 1920’s when it was hurt by falling markets. The William Davies Company merged with three other packing firms to create Canada Packers, which continued to operate from this site until 1932. The last of the company’s buildings here were demolished in the 1990’s.”
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An old illustrated map of the area now called the West Don Lands. The red letters are as follows:
A – Gooderham & Worts, now the Distillery District
B – William Davies Company, now Corktown Common
C – CNR tracks
D – the Don River
A version of this illustration also appeared in a blogTO post about the William Davies Company.
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The last remains of the pork processing business disappeared long ago. After remaining vacant for a number of years, the site was developed into a park as part of the West Don Lands rebuilding.
The park is starting to look a lot greener as the plants and trees grow. This photo was taken from on top of one of the man made hills in the park. August 2014
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There are now lots of butterflies….
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… and bees
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A pavilion made of steel and wood sits atop a small hill in the middle of the play area. The pavilion was designed by by Maryann Thompson Architects of Boston The blue and green ovals are where there are fountains for warm weather water play.
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Looking west, and slightly north, from the pavilion towards the downtown area. West Don Lands redevelopment in the immediate background. Autumn 2013 (the building under construction is now almost complete – see above)
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Looking northeast through the wood and red metal sculpture, ‘No Shoes’, by Mark di Suvero. May 2014
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The trees are starting to grow. They don’t look like much at the moment but give them time!
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There is even a large raspberry bush but by the looks of it, only the birds and insects have found it!
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A map of the area today. The red X marks the spot of the new park.
When the park opened in 2013, urbantoronto.ca had an article about it. You can read about it here
Some wonderful aerial views of the area can be seen in another wordpress blog
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as I walk Toronto 