On Saturday, I got the chance to play tourist in my own town by taking a gallery tour of West Queen West with the inimitable Betty Ann Jordan, a local art writer and flâneur extraordinaire. Each week Jordan dons her familiar orange leather coat and leads small groups ($15 each or $25 per couple) from the Gladstone and Drake hotels along Queen West to Shaw Street, stopping at most of the notable galleries and design spaces along the way. It was a brilliant afternoon! I misspent my youth on Queen Street West, playing in an indie rock band, sharing a house on Bathurst Street with local artists (John Brown, among others) and generally living the bohemian life. But as familiar as I am with the terrain, Jordan’s acute knowledge of the local scene coupled with her personal anecdotes and well-researched history of the street brought the milieu to life for me like never before. For example, did you know that Wicked (1032 Queen West) is an adults only “hedonistic” club? I didn’t.
We started our tour at the Gladstone Hotel where Jordan provided access to some of the artist-designed guest rooms, spaces we never would have gained access to otherwise. My favorite was Allyson Mitchell’s Faux Naturelle room, above, with its plush, wall-size tapestry depicting Playboy-inspired nymphs in a forest glade. From there it was on to the Drake Hotel for a tour of the art-rich public spaces.
Then we hopscotched in and out of a number of galleries, some, like Akau Framing (1186 Queen Street West, rear unit) and David Kaye Gallery (1092 Queen Street West, entrance on Dovercourt), which are tucked onto side streets where we’d have surely missed them without a guide. A well-established framing studio, Akau has been barting services with local artists for two decades; the show up now includes highlights from the resultant collection assembled by studio owner Fenanda Faria. David Kaye has just installed a group exhibition, Painters of the Gallery, on until January 17.
The most arresting exhibit we saw was by photographer Jock Sturges at Stephen Bulger Gallery. Sturges’s beautiful and controversial portraits of naturist families raise eyebrows and objections from critics who say he crosses the line into child pornography. The artist will be in attendance for a reception Wednesday evening (December 9, 8 – 10 pm).
We made a slight detour onto gallery-rich Ossington Avenue where we caught the final day of Photorama, Gallery TPW’s annual fundraising exhibition. This year’s show included a print by world-reknowned photographer Edward Burtynsky (Socar Oil Fields #3 Baku Azerbajian, 2006) priced at $900, a fraction of its market value. Gallery executive director Gary Hall said the first 15 people through the door on opening day scooped up the edition of 15 prints.
In addition to the gallery hopping, Jordan shared insights into some of the street art that makes Queen West such a vibrant neighbourhood. We paused at the Fly window gallery (1172 Queen Street West) to see The Toronto Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef (above, up until December 31) and Jordan pointed out the mural below, which started out as a riff on Katsushika Hokusai’s The Great Wave before someone added a garden hose.
I recommend Jordan’s West Queen West Art Walk to anyone, whether visiting from out of town or long-time Torontonians who’d like to see their city through fresh eyes. Thanks Betty Ann!
Photos by Christopher Jones (except the Ed Burtynsky, of course)
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