If you’ve ever wanted to really dig into the West Queen West art scene, this Saturday (March 5) is your chance to hitch a ride on the coattails of somebody who really knows her way around, art writer/enthusiast Betty Ann Jordan, left. Sponsored by the West Queen West Business Improvement Association and previously held on the first Thursday evening of each month, the WQW BIA has jumped to Saturday afternoons and expanded its free programming to include music and, as the year unfolds, dance and theatre.
The West Queen West BIA is the city’s first such organization to hire an artistic director, Nicholas Longstaff, who has dubbed this first installment the March of Song. In addition to Jordan’s guided tour of various galleries and retail pockets, the afternoon will feature a range of chorale groups performing in parks (Trinity Bellwoods) and parking lots between Bathurst Street and Gladstone Avenue (the BIA’s boundaries), and the Canadian Film Centre is programming shorts in shop windows along the stroll.
Says Longstaff: “We’re aiming to create a real sense of event with these First Saturdays, we’re calling them multi-arts festivals.”
Jordan leads paid art tours of the strip every other Saturday in conjunction with the Gladstone and the Drake hotels, so participants will be saving themselves $25 by tagging along on First Saturdays. This week’s tour includes stops at the Gladdy (including artist talks), MKG 127, XSpace Cultural Centre, O’Born Contemporary, Toronto Photographers Workshop, Angell Gallery, Paul Petro Contemporary and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art. Along the route Jordan will announce “scrambles” where participants will be invited to split up and duck into specialized retail boutiques and/or cool coffee shops.
“The galleries are the intellectual heart and soul of the neighbourhood,” says Jordan, “but independent retail also makes it so fun to be here. In nearly every independent shop the person behind the cash register is also the person who makes the items or does the importing.”
“In terms of the art, there is ALWAYS something good on Queen West,” says Jordan, “always! And it changes every month. For my walks I try to make sure there’s something more vanguard, something that’s accessible, something that’s material-based, something design-oriented – I look for each of those access points so that no matter what your taste you leave feeling energized by the art.”
This will be a big weekend for Jordan, who’s also giving a talk on Sunday at The Artist Project (Queen Elizabeth Building, March 3 – 6) where she’ll attempt to make sense of abstraction for those who didn’t benefit from an art history course in college (1 – 2 pm Sunday).
“I’m going to try to unpack it a bit,” says Jordan with a chuckle, “to provide some points of entry for people who might otherwise find it challenging.”
And she’ll do it with zest and good humour, too. She certainly did on the walk I took with her last year.
WHERE/WHEN: First Saturday, 11 am – 8:30 pm on Queen Street West from Bathurst to Gladstone; Art + Design Walking Tour starts at 12 pm at the Gladstone Hotel, March of Song begins 2 pm in Trinity Bellwoods Park.
Betty Ann is pictured in front of Alexa Hatanaka’s mural, Feed the Ponch & Under One Roof on Queen West east of Ossington. Photos by Christopher Jones
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