Jalan2 on the 2-4 Weekend

21 May — First the Indonesian, then the Canadiana.

Jalan2 is headline-speak for jalan-jalan, which literally means “streets” but as a colloquial expression (at least when I lived on Lombok) means “out and about… out exploring…”

2-4 Weekend is Canadian trendy-speak for the May 24 holiday weekend, in honour of what is still officially called Victoria Day, which in turn honours the 1819 birth date of that particular British (and Empire!) monarch.

And if you didn’t need any help to decode this post title, then bravo! You are such a global citizen.

All that to say: here I am in the fresh morning sunshine on our 2-4 Weekend, all set to jalan-jalan and see what’s happening. Plan is to weave my way down through the east-end Distillery District — the 19th-c. Gooderham and Worts distillery complex repurposed into shops and entertainment — and then west along the lake front.

I am ambushed enroute. Of course! First by this minx down an alley just S/W of Parliament & Dundas …

… and then by this rather heroic-looking dog, same building different angle.

“This is the story of a famous dog,” says the legend neatly painted into the mural. I wonder if the dog is famous for protecting people who sling sneakers over wires, or for protecting the rest of us from sneaker-slingers — but alas, no explanation on the wall, and no-one to ask.

I suppose I am some sort of frenemy of the Distillery District. I love the 13 acres of Victorian industrial architecture, love that it has been saved and repurposed, love the additional vitality it brings to a lakefront part of town that was far too shabby for far too long. I don’t particularly love how relentlessly upmarket it all is and how, somehow, the architecture and its artefacts are more exploited as decor elements than respected for their intrinsic value.

And then I smack myself upside the head and get on with enjoying what’s to hand. For there is lots to enjoy, including sleek new design elements — such as the zigzac metal railing that incorporates succulents — that complement the heritage buildings very nicely indeed.

You can see a glimpse of old brick building to the right, and to the left some of the tents for today’s arts and crafts fair, with lovely items, hand-made and largely regional. (Also “fully priced,” to use the investment euphemism.)

Having snarled about the way heritage artefacts are treated, I should in fairness salute the ones that are well displayed and well explained. Like this fragment of an old molasses storage tank, still in its original location — Building 9 — which is nowadays the Arta Gallery, home to contemporary Canadian and international art.

I particularly like the scratch high up, framed by the corner. I like to imagine it’s a freeform bird, an artistic graffito by some worker’s clever hand. But no, it’s just a scratch.

Out of the Distillery District, south again on Parliament Street and almost immediately I veer into the back lot shared by a car-detailing / rust protection centre and an Autoshare franchise. Utilitarian concrete walls all around, but also fully painted all around. Definitely wall art. And here’s my favourite bit — mostly because of the bonus glimpse of an ANSER face, peeping over the edge on the south side.

I wobble around for a while, cut across to Sherbourne and drop down to The Esplanade, where I investigate this Stonehenge of photography on the S/E corner. I’m drawn by curiosity and also by the big red A — which I have also photographed, and most recently used in my May 5 post.

This display is on one edge of the mixed-income St. Lawrence complex of buildings, very innovative when it opened a few decades ago, with its emphasis on good housing stock for people with limited means, but with enough sliding-scale accomodation to avoid creating a ghetto. The art project, Reflections of the Esplanade, is the result of 2 months of workshops with 5 “budding photographers” who live in the area and were sent out to photograph it.

On down Sherbourne, into Sherbourne Common. It’s a futuristic looking park cum public art gallery cum water treatment facility that stretches from Lakeshore Blvd E. to the lakefront, hopping Queen’s Quay E. as it goes.

Layer upon layer, looking north with a backdrop of the elevated Gardiner Expressway and the city beyond. Then one of the three towers through which storm and lake water (first treated underground) is aerated, splashing back down the mesh curtain into a channel — on the right — that carries it safely to the lake.

Interspersed with the towers are plantings and playthings — one of them the whirly disc, where you can see a father spinning his child who is squealing his little head off, one hopes with joy.

And here’s the channel, in its last curves southward to the lake, with the Toronto islands beyond and happy boats, literated from winter, dancing in between.

Sugar Beach, just to the west near the Redpath Sugar Refinery that gives it its name, is also in full swing, you betcha.

For us, the May 24 weekend is the start of summer, who cares about the June 21 solstice. This is the traditional weekend to re-open your seasonal cottage, for example, and to start planting annuals in your garden. If you plant them sooner and there’s another frost and they die, it’s Your Fault. If you plant them now and there’s another frost, any resulting deaths are Not Your Fault.

On west to Harbourfront, and more photography on display, this time an exhibition presented by the Toronto Port Authority called Uncharted Waters: Toronto’s Enigmatic Waterfront. It really is terrific. It comes down end of June, after a year’s run. Go see it now.

Still heading west, with the lake on my left and now a pond on the right that, in winter, is a skating rink. No skates these days!

And beyond that, another bunch of tents, very like the ones back in the Distillery District, but this time with a decided emphasis on kid-friendly activities.

For example: a chance for children to try basic acrobatic manoeuvres, guided by members of the Circus Academy.

I pause, delighted with the delight of the proud kiddies and even prouder parents, but also enjoying an extra layer of memory. One day, exploring Gerrard St. East with Phyllis (she of the Tuesday Walking Society), we stumbled into the rehearsal space for the combined Academy, Centre of Gravity, and Zero Gravity Circus.

When I finally walk on, it is to stop again, as enchanted as everyone else by the mime work of this Zero Gravity troupe member, who rules us all with gestures punctuated by imperious flicks of her fan.

Here she has singled out a man in the crowd with a cup of fresh fruit and — silently — demanded that he feed her a morsel. She swoops as delicately as a ballerina and waits, mouth open for the tribute.

Somewhat stunned, he does as commanded. It gives me an idea: I go get myself a cup of fresh cherries – after first indulging in a Beaver Tail pastry, dusted with the traditional sugar & cinnamon coating. Yum!

But it doesn’t take circus members, or a special fair, to create opportunities for play.

Wave decks will do very nicely. There are three in this section of the waterfront; today I stop at the Simcoe Wave Deck, at the foot of the eponymous street. (Don’t you just love a chance to use that adjective?)

Yellow glulam cedar and ipe wood shape the undulations; assorted anti-slip features (and a lake-side railing) are there to keep you safe. But hey, that band along each contour edge is just made for sliding.

Adults and some kids do it decorously, feet-first. This exuberant little guy (half-hidden by his watching mother) has just hurtled down head-first.

Enough! I finally turn back east toward home. It’s been a fine start to the Canadian version of the summer season. And I rack up 12.5 km, very respectable, to boot.

CLICK!

Distillery Historic District – www.thedistillerydistrict.com/history.php
Arta Gallery – www.artagallery.ca
Reflections of the Esplanade exhibit – www.jamiiesplanade.org
Uncharted Waters: Toronto’s Enigmatic Waterfront exhibit – www.harbourfrontcentre.com/unchartedwaters
The Circus Academy – www.TheCircusAcademy.ca which takes you to http://centreofgravity.ca
Zero Gravity Circus – www.zerogravitycircus.com
Toronto waterfront information – www.waterfrontoronto.ca then on the Explore Projects menu click Central Waterfront for the wave decks, or East Bayfront for Sugar Beach and Sherbourne Common

2 Comments

by icelandpenny on May 21, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, Nature, photography, street art, Uncategorized, Walking

Tagged circus, Distillery District, Harbourfront, industrial architecture, parks, pastries, Sherbourne Common, waterfront

Posted by icelandpenny on May 21, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/jalan2-on-the-2-4-weekend/

The Lady from Spain… on Dundas Street

19 May — Well, not a real in-the-flesh lady. Though I bet at any given moment, there are some of those somewhere along the street.

What I’m talking about here is the limerick Lady from Spain. No need to avert your eyes! This is one of those very rare limericks that may actually be quoted in polite society.

There was a young lady from Spain

Who used to get sick on the train

Not once or twice

Which is decent and nice

But again and again and again.

I find myself quoting this ditty, or at least that last line, when faced with endless repetition of some task or situation. “Again and again and again,” I moan.

And that’s where Dundas St. comes into the story, because by now that shuttle to/from the Art Gallery of Ontario is getting pretty darn repetitive. The street is endlessly dynamic, but after you’ve walked a particular 2-km stretch some 12,387 times (give or take)… you tend to go on auto-pilot.

So I set myself a challenge. After all, I’ve got that quote from Marcel Proust on my blog page to remind me that discovery requires new eyes, not new landscape. Right! I’ll pay attention!

And I did. And I saw new things… and some old things differently.

For example, Dundas Square, smack at Yonge Street. It’s a great functional open plaza, well suited to the outdoor events for which it was designed, but oh my stars, so stark and charmless. Brutalist architecture at its worst.

New eyes… I really look, & I really see.

I see people enjoying the space, I see sun rays dancing down, I see this cyclist in particular, so relaxed in his early-morning break between where he’s been and where he’s going.

Then I spin on my heels, looking west to Yonge, and there’s a tour bus.

Not full (it’s early yet), but the passengers are also happy in the fresh sunshine. Someone on the open deck, eagerly taking photos. The season has begun.

Another block west to Bay, and with a giggle of delight I jay-walk to the north side. Lots of bicycles chained up both sides of the street — we’re well into cycling season again — and one in particular has caught my eye.

It would be this one… Decorated fore and aft (those roses bloom from a side basket). See too the cyclist pedalling by, there high on the left-hand side. A few posts ago, I raphsodized about “random acts of bicycle” and I tell you, this walk is full of them.

Having crossed to the north side of Dundas, I stay there for a few more blocks, which positions me to enjoy the way the sun glints off the office tower at University Avenue. The building reflects other buildings — another of my favourite themes — but this time I’m more taken with the sparkling sunlight, and the way it throws building angles into sharp relief.

One more thing to notice: that “snow route” sign. Like the “hurricane evacuation route” signs you see in other climates, these signs stay up year-round.

Somewhere around here I cross back to the south side, which means I walk right past 52 Division of the Toronto Police. And, because I’m committed to really looking at things this time around, I pay attention to the doorway.

Bold Chinese characters on the glass – entirely appropriate for this neighbourhood, but something I had never before noticed.

Soon I’m approaching McCaul St., and the AGO on the far corner. Nearing the corner I look up, to the right, and stop to enjoy this Very Downtown bit of streetscape.

Mellow old brick, rusty old fire escapes, bold 21st-c. tagging, and a street car. Hello, Toronto!

After my AGO shift I have some time to kill before a late-afternoon meeting, so I head out for a walk. Familiar territory: Grange Park immediately south of the Gallery, and John St., which runs south from the park. I start down John, turn west into an alley I’d never noticed before, and come to a cross-alley.

Also one I’d never noticed before, and with the dignity of a name: Cayley Lane. Not that it’s a very dignified lane!

Doesn’t look very artistic to me, hardly what I’d call street art, but I explore.

It has its moments, if you look closely. This dual message for example — cryptic, and puzzling too. Surely it’s self-contradictory?

There are a few doorways, each heavily tagged. One also has a piece of rusty old iron propped up on the nearby wooden ledge. I’ve no idea what it is, but I like its lines.

I step closer, and find the ironwork has its own decoration.

Which brings me to the north end of the lane, and also quite close to meeting time. I nip back through Grange Park and then, just immediately behind and at the west end of the Gallery building, look up at the Barnacle Staircase that connects the 4th and 5th levels on the south side.

Isn’t it perfectly named? And isn’t it wonderful? One of the two whimsical (& functional) staircases that Frank Gehry integrated into the architecture, its metal shines in the sun — but the metal is no match for the sparkle of the tower’s cladding or, for that matter, of the sky itself.

One final random act of bicycle, found among the great lines of bikes chained up at the Weston Family Learning Centre end of the AGO.

Maybe you can make out the lettering, maybe not. That classy wooden bike basket is a recycled wine case from Osoyoos Larose, a vitner based in the South Okanagan distict of British Columbia.

None of this was spectacular, but it was really satisfying. I did, most of the time, look with new eyes, and that allowed me to see and to discover. No “Lady from Spain” chant for me, not this time.

12 Comments

by icelandpenny on May 19, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged Art Gallery of Ontario, Frank Gehry, limericks, Marcel Proust, Philosophy

Posted by icelandpenny on May 19, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/05/19/the-lady-from-spain-on-dundas-street/

400 Backpacks; 5,000 children

12 May — Today, of all days, is the best possible day to show you Snake Ceiling.

Any day would be good — it’s a terrific bit of installation art, some 400 backpacks interconnected to form a great, sinuous snake that coils its path around the ceiling overhead.

Here how it looks, greeting visitors at the top of the Scissor Staircase in the Art Gallery of Ontario.

It’s the work of contemporary Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, and a sneak preview (snake preview..) of the major exhibition of his work, Ai WeiWei: According to What?, that will run at the AGO from August 17 to October 27, 2013.

$Chinese contemporary artist, Ai Wei\wei$

But Snake Ceiling is more than a dramatic, clever example of installation art. It contains hidden stories, other messages.

One is the story of how it got up there, stays there, and fits its space so well. Who ever thinks about that? I wouldn’t have, except that, as an AGO volunteer near the staircase, I saw some of the process and learned about the rest of it.

First the AGO team conferred with Weiwei’s studio back in China, and agreed on how to configure the snake for this particular 20 X 60 foot rectangle. Next they computer-cut the plywood form to which the snake would be attached.

Another challenge: figure out where and how to place the supports, to ensure that this heavy installation, once suspended, stayed there. After that… lift and lash each section into place.

The whole experience taught me to have great respect for the background work that goes into presenting art to the public — something I now enjoying sharing with our visitors.

I like that story a lot — but it’s the other hidden story that explains why I chose to publish this post today, May 12.

Each backpack has numbers stitched into it, the same three numbers.

5 dot 12. May 12. That’s the date, in 2008, of the massive Sichuan earthquake in China. More than 90,000 people died, some 5,000 of them schoolchildren, whose buildings collapsed around them. Snake Ceiling is Ai Weiwei’s memorial to those children.

Enjoy the art any time. Come see it in person if you can, or see it along with the rest of the exhibition as of August 17. But, today of all days, consider all the meanings that flow from those backpacks and give them a moment of quiet thought.

CLICK!

www.ago.net/aiweiwei – Art Gallery of Ontario page about the upcoming exhibition, with link to Snake Ceiling in particular
http://aiweiweineversorry.com – home page for Alison Klayman’s movie about Weiwei, “the inside story of a dissident for the digital age”
http://aiweiwei.com – the artist’s own home page, not at the moment opening to anything else but showing links to various social media

1 Comment

by icelandpenny on May 12, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in City, Travel, Uncategorized

Tagged AGO, arts, installation art, Sichuan earthquake, Chinese earthquake, Ai Weiwei, Snake Ceiling

Posted by icelandpenny on May 12, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/400-backpacks-5000-children/

The First of Spring… & a “frozen chosen”

10 May — 11 km or so in warm sunny weather, tracing Highland Creek (Bendale Branch) S/W through the ravine it has created and the parks that now protect and showcase that ravine: Birkdale, Thomson Memorial, Bendale and Cedarbrook.

The firsts of spring… First day to walk in short sleeves, first day to carry water and extra sun-block, first sniff of warm, fresh-mown grass, first slope of trilliums. (Also first growl of totally unnecessary air-conditioning from some idiot’s home…)

The Tuesday Walking Society has taken itself to what, for downtowners, is always mysterious territory: the upper reaches of Scarborough, a municipality to the east too often dismissed with a patronizing “Scarberia.” But we’ve learned to respect its parks, and here we are again, doing a very pretty down-and-back through those linked parks that takes us N/S from Ellesmere Rd to well below Lawrence East, and W/E from just east of Midland Av. to Markham Rd.

Highland Creek is the thread — not dramatic, just pretty, but very pretty at that.

Attractive to passing humans, irresistable to dogs. We watch a pair of Golden Labs hurtle joyfully toward the creek, their owner calling them back with that despairing, amused tone that says she knows it’s pointless but she must at least try… One dog pays no attention, the other pauses, but briefly, and she gives up with: “Ahh! And just back from the dog-groomer! There’s 50 bucks down the drain!”

Well, no — into the creek, more like.

There are numerous paths down into Birkdale Park, the northernmost one where we start, a reminder that the city surrounds us even though, tucked into the ravine, you don’t see any of it. Some of these paths are marked by tall, elegant light standards — self-sufficient, too, each one generating its own solar/wind power.

Another sign of the times: work throughout this vast watershed to renaturalize creek banks that had been straightened and paved, in the wisdom of the day, to control mosquito and other health risks. We now recognize a larger context, with larger risks. Let us hope that the wisdom of our own day proves a better choice!

Lots of weeping willows here in Birkdale, all electric yellow-green as their leaves beginn to unfurl.

Such fun at the Brimley Rd. end of this park, a children’s playground with the usual cheerful stuff, including teeter-totters, each with its “Saddle Mate.” I know, quite shabby, needs a repaint, yet I love them as they are — somehow this decodes to me as a sign of happy use, not of neglect.

Across Brimley Rd, honked at by some indignant motorist who is nowhere near us or the lane we’re crossing but seems to take offence at a pair of senior-citizen jaywalkers. We mutter, but do not give him the finger. We have standards.

On south through the well-organized facilities of Thomson Memorial Park, not knowing that, on our return trip north, it will guide us to the domain of the “frozen chosen.”

But that lies in the future. For now we’re still heading south-east, enjoying the trail, the creek, and nature unfolding all around us. Like these crabpple blossoms…

Well, I’m saying crab-apple because that’s how Phyllis identified them. I wouldn’t know, but she’s up on things like this.

On down, all pretty, after a while we’re in Bendale Park and about to take the underpass beneath Lawrence East. I’ve just been remarking to Phyllis that we haven’t seen any graffiti. Most of me approves; a tiny smidge of me, with my new interest in street art, is looking around with a hopeful eye.

And there it is — the spray cans for sure found this underpass. Most of it boring, ugly, with ugly and unimaginative messages. (“F*** You!” says, one, all four letters supplied — as if nobody ever thought of that before.) But then…

I giggle. I love it. Thank you, Bern.

Southern end of the line is Cedarbrook Park, where we poke around a couple of spur lines to the main trail, ultimately doing an unintended but helpful loop that positions us to start north again. Woven through here are signs like this one, a Vita Course laid out for athletic keeners.

We are not that keen. We admire the intent, hope lots of people take part… but choose just to keep walking, thank you.

Somewhere, as we head back north-west, we pass close enough to some neighbourhood back yards to see two of the great emblems of Toronto in spring: an exuberant great forsythia bush, with a magnolia tree behind.

Forsythia is so – literally – unremarkable the rest of the year, but it has this brief golden moment.

As we cross back through Thomson Memorial Park, we decide to check out the Scarborough Historical Museum, a modest little frame building in the park grounds.

That’s where we learn about the Thomson in question — not Tom-the-painter, not Tommy-the-parks-commissioner, not Ken-the-arts–patron — none of those guys. It’s David Thomson, who came to Upper Canada with his brother in 1796, build his log cabin and became the first permanent resident of what is now Scarborough.

We chat with a friendly woman in period dress, getting ready to make scones the pioneer way with a group of school children. “Most have no idea how these things used to be done, all by hand, over an open fire,” she says. “They love it.”

She suggests we climb up though the east side of the park to St. Andrews Rd, to visit the old (but still active) cemetery there. We squint along her pointed finger to get directions, and set off.

Not before reading, in horrified amazement, a plaque to a settler woman who raised 37 children. No, not a typo: 37.

Mind you — 20 of them were step-children, part of the package with her choice of widower-husbands — but that still leaves 17 of her own, doesn’t it. We read dates: she bore those 17 children over a period of 30 years, and raised all those other kids to boot. Good grief.

The final slope up to St. Andrews Rd. shines at us, green and white. All those dots are trilliums, Ontario’s provincial wildflower, a forest groundcover that blooms briefly and wonderfully before the canopy appears and steals the sun.

Trilliiums love slopes, here they are faces to the sun, on well-drained land, toes in leaf litter, couldn’t be happier. Niether could I, because I love them. (Early Montreal & Laurentian mountain memories, and cottages later.)

That Montreal heritage gets another outing moments later, when we turn right on St. Andrews, and right again into the little cemetery where someone is industriously tidying up deadfall and leaf-litter. He greets us, smiling, and I laugh out loud at his T-shirt. “I love my wife” it says, only the “my wife” is stroked through and “HOCKEY!” triumphantly added to one side. He’s a Leafs fan, I’m by early imprinting faithful to the Habs, both teams are at that point still in the playoffs, we exchange a few barbs, he welcomes us to the cemetery anyway.

He’s the perfect guide: a member of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church across the road, and of the committee that cares for this cemetery. “I know some people call us God’s frozen chosen,” he says, just a bit defensively, “but I think we’re pretty friendly.” Very friendly indeed, as he points out the names that keep repeating on the markers — Thomson (of couse), McCowan, Chester, Wilson, and more — many of them now also familiar to us as street and park names and subway station stops.

The cemetery reminds us they weren’t always titles for cement and pavement; they were people.

Bums on Bronze (& the alphabet, again)

5 May — The walk started with a Henry Moore, at least what I chose to think of as The Walk, as opposed to the no-capital-letters walk that got me to the AGO in the first place for my meeting. So, meeting finished, out the door again with the idea of heading down to King St. East in Corktown.

First pause, always, to enjoy how much the public enjoys Henry Moore’s massive — and massively friendly — sculpture “Two Forms” at the N/E corner of the building.

Inside the building, we don’t let people climb on the Moores, you bet we don’t, but out here… it’s bums on bronze, all the time. It’s recognized as an act of love… even if, as the conservators point out, this much love over this many years has in places worn through the patination right down to the rivets.

People are always leaning on these undulating shapes, stroking them, sliding across them — but never tagging them. The love is in a context of respect.

South on McCaul (yet again! I’m always leading you south on McCaul these days) and at the cross-alley called Renfrew Place, more public art. Street version, though, not sculptor. This time the design isn’t up to much, it’s the words that catch my attention.

Pick your focus: ghetto art, love, first nation. All the same hand, I think, so I spend a moment trying to find the unifying thread among the messages. I don’t succeed, and I don’t suppose it matters.

Other end of the short alley, over at St. Patrick, a vivid great mural is now being reclaimed by the underlying wall, as bits flake off. Or, perhaps, it’s just that the underlying wall is beginning to redesign the imagery. At least in places. I quite like this patch.

Pretty soon I’m down on King West approaching Bay St., a whole different mood thank you, heart of the financial district and all. I slide between the sombre black towers of Toronto Dominion Centre (architect Mies van der Rohe) into the courtyard… and greet the cows.

Yes! More bums on bronze, this time on one of the 7 cows in Joe Fafard’s ”The Pasture” — all life-sized and equally placid whatever the season. My mind flashes back to winter, when I explored downtown sculptures in the snow, and the cows looked like this instead:

Well that’s distant memory, isn’t it? Today by preference I’m walking on the shady side of the street.

Eastward, eastward on King, I cross Yonge St. and admire a slender bit of parkette, neatly lined up between two buildings on the north side. We have a lot of these slivers, and they pay hugely disproportionate dividends in public beauty and sociability.

There’s a statue toward the back of this parkette, some frock-coated geezer. I think of going in, I shrug (it’s just another bronze frock-coated geezer), I walk past.

Then I double back, and decide to check him out. You never know, right? You might learn something.

Or discover something else. Like this gum disposal dodad. I never knew such a thing existed.

Here’s the park — a very pedestrian (no pun intended) shot indeed, but it does show gum disposal tucked demurely on one wall, statue holding court to the right rear, and a window washer to its right, who has just rapelled down the wall. It would have been easy enough to notice the guys, both bronze and human, and overlook the gum.

Geezer-statue is pretty interesting after all: Irish-born James Beaty (1798-1892), “shoemaker, politician, businessman, newspaper publisher and populist.” I’d always thought George Brown had a lock on being our newspaper publisher/populist in that era, but not a bit of it. When typographers struck both papers, Beaty accepted and supported their demands while Brown fought them tooth and nail.

And here’s the irony: this statue is almost next door to George Brown Community College.

I walk on, glad I made the effort to investigate the statue.

Always pays to look up, in this part of town. At the faded advertising atop 197 King East, for example (whose ground floor is now, fittingly enough, an antiques shop). I can’t make out the words. It doesn’t matter.

More messaging at street level, just as cryptic but this time I can decode it: it’s the ANSER-face you find more often in the west end, but here it (she? he?) is again.

Lots of tidy oval plaques on these old buildings, to tell you their Victorian lives. Here a bedding manufacturer, I read; here a meat packing operation; and here, most wonderfully of all because of the combination, a tavern and druggist shop. Talk about one-stop shopping! Hangover plus remedy, in one convenient location.

Another wonderful combination: art gallery plus coffee shop.

The slightly askew rooster announces Gallery 402, no prize for guessing the King East street number, where the current show is called “Transports of Delight.” It’s very well named if you happen to love Toronto streetcars, because they feature prominently in photographer Eric Morse’s selections on view. (Neither gallery nor Morse has a website, but he is on Twitter – http://twitter.com/eriq49 )

And… within a few blocks, at the south end of Gilead Place, the perfect introduction to my reprise of the joke phonetic alphabet I mentioned in my previous post.

My thanks to araneus1 (visit his blog at http://araneus1.wordpress.com), who suggested ”Z for Zoidberg” to finish the alphabet with a flourish. It was a good reminder of lobster-man, as I’d always nicknamed that particular cartoon character (TV show, Futurama).

But the added challenge is to incorporate a pun, some kind of word-play, so I’m still on the hunt.

More thanks, this time to answerbag.com and Wikipedia, for the following, which is very close to my memory of the version my parents found so funny:

In the 1930s, the comedy double act Clapham and Dwyer recorded the following version:
A for ‘orses (hay for horses)
B for mutton (beef or mutton)
C for ‘th highlanders (Seaforth Highlanders)
D for ‘ential (deferential); my parents, D for dumb (deaf or dumb)
E for Adam (Eve or Adam)
F for ‘vescence (effervescence)
G for police (Chief of police)
H for respect (age for respect)
I for Novello (Ivor Novello)
J for oranges (Jaffa oranges)
K for ‘ancis (Kay Francis)
L for leather (Hell for leather)
M for ‘sis (emphasis); my parents, M for sema (emphysema)
N for ‘adig (infradig); my parents, N for mation (information)
O for the garden wall (over the garden wall); my parents, O for a beer
P for a penny (pee for a penny); me — well, that’s rude!
Q for a song (cue for a song)
R for mo’ (half a mo’)
S for you (it’s for you)
T for two (tea for two)
U for films (UFA films); my parents, U for mism (euphemism)
V for La France (Vive La France)
W for a bob (double you for a bob)
X for breakfast (eggs for breakfast)
Y for Gawd’s sake (why, for God’s sake); my parents, Y for husband (wife or husband)
Z for breezes (zephyr breezes)”; me, won’t do! that’s American “zee” & not “zed”
Source and further information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockney_alphabet

Like I said, I’m still after a “zed for…” Plus any other versions of any other letter, because I am a sucker for these word-play jokes…

4 Comments

by icelandpenny on May 5, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged ANSER, coffee shops, Henry Moore, Joe Fafard, phonestic alphabet, public art, puns, sculpture, Toronto, wordplay

Posted by icelandpenny on May 5, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/05/05/bums-on-bronze-the-alphabet-again/

Warmth on the Waterfront (& Jane’s Rule)

2 May — There we were, the Tuesday Walking Society, bare-handed and more concerned about sun block than extra layers of clothing! And if we’d had any lingering doubts about spring, the rest of the human- and wildlife around us quickly dispelled it.

We were on the waterfront, parked ’way west at the entrance to the twinned Humber Bay parks, east and west – like a pair of lungs poking into the lake a bit west of the Humber River. With sunshine and near-20C temps, the world was giddy with joy. Skateboards, roller-blades, bikes, feet, dogs & adults & kids.

And birds! Canada geese, swans, Mallard ducks, gulls, swallows, one blazing Cardinal, sound-of-woodpecker, and even more sound (plus sight) of Red wing blackbird. Goodness those guys have a distinctive call — they can accordian-fold their yellow and red chevrons out of sight, but the call gives them away. All this feathered life, in total Fast Forward, which is the only way to tackle the short Canadian spring season.

Oh! I forgot the ravens.

These ravens stand guard over the Home Garden, which anchors the west end of a ribbon of additional greenspace — Humber Bay Shores — that runs along the lakefront between the two parks and the mouth of the river.

The very neat thing about these ravens is that they double as birdhouses! See all that straw poking through the metal? Real birds know a good location when they spot one, and there`s a nest inside every sculpture.

Million-dollar views for the feathered inhabitants — something they have in common (or so say the billboards) with future residents of all the condos so furiously under construction just across the road behind the greenspace.

There’s also a deliberate birdhouse, or anyway the sculptural concept of one, to go with the ravens. Maybe it’s in use as well, for you certainly see little birds hopping about on the roof. Their backdrop is another sort of bird, the construction crane.

Phyllis and I continue east, leaving the Home Garden segment and entering the wildflower garden and the rest of the Humber Bay Butterfly Habitat. It’s carefully set out with all the elements that butterflies need, from appropriate flower and shrub plantings to nearby water to wonderful flat rocks where they may rest and warm themselves.

I’ve noticed the rocks before, but this time I also notice the words carved into them. All very butterfly…

Dance, Enchant, Flutter… It takes us a moment to twig. The words continue, and there`s nothing random about their choice and order. It’s the whole A to Z! Including those tricky letters at the end, which in this list become Twinkle, Unfold, Vibrant, Wanderlust, Explore [a wee bit of a cheat], Yonder and Zigzag.

I giggle, remembering a long-ago, pun-laden phonetic alphabet my parents used to chant, British in origin, that started ”A for ‘orses” and offered a triumphant solution for that tricky 24th letter. “X for breakfast.” Oh, groan.

A bit farther east, more rocks catch my eye, this time right on the shore and definitely not part of the butterfly alphabet. Though… the message does start with an ”A”!

And yet more rocks — great big ones, boulders almost – at Sheldon Lookout, the point of land at the mouth of the Humber. I note small plaques on one flat rock, and crouch to read. They provide compass bearings and directional arrows, showing where the sun rises for the winter and summer solstices. I’m charmed to see that, on 21 June, the sun rises directly over the art-deco Sunnyside Pavilion.

We retrace our steps westward, and enter Humber Bay Park East (which has many more trails than its twin). I tug Phyllis toward one side of the park. I’m looking for, and I find, another set of compass bearings, another directional arrow – but this one deeply sorrowful. Majestic, moving, and so sorrowful.

It points to Ahakista, Ireland, where, on 23 June 1985, Air India flight 182 exploded and crashed to the earth. The flight originated in Canada, and the loss of life was horrific. All those hundreds of names are carved into a sombre wall to one side of this plinth. Here, carved around the arrow, are the words:

Time Flies Suns Rise and Shadows Fall Let It Pass By Love Reigns Forever Over All

I find myself tapping my heart as I read. It moves me, every time.

There’s a magic about many of our urban parks, and Humber Bay shares it. Turn your face one way, and there’s the city; turn around, and you see only nature. Like this – clear lapping water and the first hint of blossoms on trees.

I see an inukshuk a little farther along the beach, and scramble down for a closer look. Isn’t this fitting? An inukshuk to stand guard over the lake, colleague of those ravens back in the Home Garden.

Quite a pot-bellied little figure isn’t he, but so carefully balanced. Neat slivers of rock shimmed in where needed, and a jaunty pebble cap on his head.

Farther along again, a mother and child, stroller left at the edge of the path, a quiet moment.

And a second mother soon after that, in the reeds by an outlet to the lake. Close to the path and the little bridge over the rivulet, but apparently not at all concerned.

It’s Phyllis who connects the dots. “That swan we were watching, on the pond just behind here,” she says. “Remember how he seemed to be patrolling, wings akimbo? I bet he’s the mate, and he is patrolling…”

It was a wonderful morning of warmth on the waterfront, its lingering charm only slightly diluted by the insane traffic jams we met as we threaded the car homeward through endless downtown street repairs and other construction.

The route brought us alongside the aged, elevated Gardiner Expresway at one point, notorious for the speed and scale with which it is shedding concrete. The city better get on with either fixing or demolishing it, or we’ll have our own long-predicted disaster — nastily reminiscent of the recent factory collapse in Bangladesh, where flaking concrete was apparently a warning sign.

All the more reason to grab a drive-by photo.

Was ever a jaundiced eye more nicely placed?

which brings us to…

JANE’S RULE

Two posts ago, I asked for your ideas about how to distinguish street art from plain old vandalism. Only one reply, but a really good one, courtesy of my English relation (and friend) Jane. She says motive is the issue, and I think she has absolutely nailed it.

If the motive is to give to the general public and to make people smile, then it’s art. If the motive is to destroy, damage or profane, then it’s vandalism.

Works for me.

11 Comments

by icelandpenny on May 2, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in City, Nature, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged Air India Flight 182, birds, butterflies, Gardiner Expressway, Humber Bay Park, sculpture, waterfront

Posted by icelandpenny on May 2, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/05/02/warmth-on-the-waterfront-janes-rule/

Why I Didn’t Get to Balzac’s

28 April — Because I got distracted, is why.

Balzac’s Coffee Roasters was the Saturday plan.

More accurately, the plan was to loop south & east after my mid-day meeting at the Art Gallery of Ontario, making my way eventually to the Distillery District, once home of Gooderham and Worts, then into Balzac’s and the reward of a great big latte treat.

This is indeed a Balzac’s latte, but from a year ago. My Saturday loop got loopier, and I got loopier with it, and what with one amusement and another, by the time I hit Sherbourne I thought… who needs Balzac’s, this time around?

First amusement, yet another fun-house-mirror moment, thanks to the AGO’s curved glass façade. Sunshine means it scoops up images like a ball to a catcher’s mitt, reflecting them back in a morphing display that dances with your own approach and perspective.

I emerge from my meeting, start south on McCaul, and automatically check the main OCAD building as I go. Being a school of art & design, there’s always something on display in the various classroom windows. Today’s offering: pots.

In the alley just past OCAD, I look for the wonderful tandem bike I showed you in my “Random Acts of Bicycle…” post — and it’s gone! The two day-glo bikes are still there, but I do wonder what happened to that rusty old tandem.

So that alley lost something, but the next alley south seems to have gained. I think (I think) a lot of this tagging is new.

Not my idea of street art (back to my earlier musing about definitions), perhaps at least in part because I can’t decode it. Also because the parts I can “read,” the bird and the pizza slice, don’t much interest me… But all in all, it sure is deep-downtown-streetscape.

Cross Queen West, south again on Duncan, a moment to admire Fusia Dog — a hot-doggery on the east side that offers wonderfully inventive, indeed fusion, combinations, such as one featuring kim chi, wasabi and carrots. Force of habit, I peer down the alley immediately to the south — and yes! this is fun.

Such a neat combination: the old Empire Office Equipment signage, the colours, the optimistic “tout est possible,” and oh… those piano keys.

Plus eco-protest. The posters added to the mural are put there by the Cree First Nation, and read: “Only when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realize we cannot eat money.”

Which takes us back to my recent post musing about street art vs vandalism: how do you react to this subsequent messaging? A powerful addition to the whole? Or disrespect for the underlying mural? Depends, I think, on one’s political leanings.

More reflections at University Avenue and Adelaide — west side of University thrown against the east side, and caught for us to admire.

Then I look north on University… and have to walk up the meridian to get a closer look. What is this? Sculpture, yes of course, on the new (to me, anyway) Shangri-La Hotel. Still mystifying, though.

Funny how the mind wants to account for whatever it sees. My mind first tries the premise that this is some fantasically-limbed creature, being swarmed by… um… other creatures. I cross for a closer look. Birds! Fluttering cascades of birds! Like these.

The sculpture is well executed, but I have to confess it puts me in mind of hordes of downtown pigeons, a species for which I share Tom Lehrer’s antipathy. (Anyone else remember his ditty about poisoning pigeons in the park?)

One last Shangri-La vignette. They are advertising condos for sale above the hotel levels of the building. Except the units are not called condos. No, this is your opportunity to purchase a high-rise “estate.” Honestly, real-estate language has no shame.

Onward, eastward and southward! A Still Life with Stickers moment at King West & Bay. Very downtown.

Equally downtown, the view right across the street: a hot dog/European sausage vendor in front of Commerce Court. Please notice not just the food cart, not just the shiny glass building to the right, but also the graceful heritage building on the left, part of the same complex.

See that lovely arch? Those were the days, weren’t they, when banks were hushed and solemn temples, and looked it.

The building was constructed 1929-31, to serve as headquarters for the Canadian Bank of Commerce. It was also, at 34 storeys in height, the tallest building in the British Empire. I like the contrast between the overall simplicity of line and the wealth of Romanesque Revival detailing. Like this beastie.

I find another plaque on the building’s east wall, just around the corner on Jordan St. Long before the bank came along, back in 1818, this location was the site of Toronto’s first Methodist church. God and mammon, indeed.

More east-and-south, and I’m approaching the Church St. Flatiron Building from its broad side, the side with Derek Besant’s mural facing onto tiny little Berczy Park, wedged between Wellington & Front streets.

Landmark building, landmark mural… yes yes… and then I notice the strip of pavement leading to the mural. Decorated pavement. I don’t know how new it is, but it’s certainly new to me.

It’s a “Friends of Berczy Park initiative” by Mike Parson, with further credit to a long list of supporters from city councillors to a local Business Improvement Association to a property developer to private individuals.

Of course there’s a pigeon in the shot. They’re omnipresent. (Maybe that Shangri-La sculpture knows what it’s about after all.)

Each segment is great fun.

And look! I even get a random act of bicycle…

CLICK!

Balzac’s Coffee Roasters – www.balzacs.com
Distillery District — www.thedistillerydistrict.com
Friends of Berczy Park — http://berczy.wordpress.com
Fusia Dog — www.fusiadog.com

5 Comments

by icelandpenny on April 28, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, City Walks, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged alley art, arts, Berczy Park, coffee bars, OCAD, pigeons, pottery, Romanesque Revival, sculpture, street food

Posted by icelandpenny on April 28, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/04/28/why-i-didnt-get-to-balzacs/

The Art of Protest

26 April — But let’s pretend it’s late March. I’m on Wellesley St. West, I’ve just crossed Bay St., I’m headed for Yonge and eventually home, and I see yet another long stretch of hoardings around an empty space.

There’s a lot of visual competition for my attention, but I focus first on a very small, plain, tidy little notice. It looks official, and it is.

It starts: “Her Majesty the Queen, in Right of Ontario…” After I manage to uncross my eyes again and stop laughing, I learn that this is her bit of land, not the community’s. She forbids us to camp, light fires, defecate, urinate, or post any notices.

What good citizens we are! We are obeying HM the Q, except for that post-no-notices bit.

I see another notice nearby, also small and plain but definitely unofficial.

Then finally I sweep my eyes across the great big message – only 5 words (plus a dog), but spread section by section across almost the entire north face of the hoardings.

***

I’ve just checked it out online again. HM the Q is right, it is her bit of land: Ontario has owned this derelict lot at 11 Wellesley St. West for several decades.

Prior to my late-March walk-past, the province reached agreement to sell the lot to Lanterra Developments. (At the risk of tautology, I add: for development.) There is no provision for a park component, or any other green-space provisions.

Some provincial members of parliament and some city councillors support local residents’ push for green space; no success as yet.

To date, ka-ching! is winning.

But the battle is not yet absolutely, definitively over.

You can follow the dynamics, or get involved, by going to Facebook — http://facebook.com/SaveWellesleyGreenPublicPark

1 Comment

by icelandpenny on April 26, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, photography, street art

Tagged civic protest, urban development, Wellesley Green Public Park

Posted by icelandpenny on April 26, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/the-art-of-protest/

Streetscape, Street Art… & plain old vandalism

22 April — The more fascinated I grow with public art, street art in all its categories, the more I find myself puzzling about where street art leaves off and plain old vandalism begins. I’m clear that both categories exist; I’m just still wondering where I draw the line, and why.

Saturday’s walk — 11 km in 1C weather, what a heroine — gave me examples up and down the scale. Lots to consider.

The walk also offered me some amusing street signs, and examples of Victorian row housing. (I know, the latter so plentiful in Europe, so unexceptional really, but much rarer here. And we must celebrate what we have.)

My walk’s turning point was Danforth & Jones, so early on I was walking north-east through Cabbagetown, always dependable territory for Victorian streetscape. Like this line-up on the south side of Spruce St., near Riverdale Park.

I love the scale, the quiet lines, and of course the still-intact slate roofing.

Later on, up in Riverdale on Logan near Victor Av., I see another line-up. This lot, dated 1891 a plaque tells me, is taller and peakier (sorry to get all technical on you), more typical of the city’s Victorian stock overall than is the Spruce St. example above.

Please note also the way the downspout on the left is connected to a water barrel, not flowing into the sewers — the City no longer allows the latter arrangement — and also please admire that brave yellow-flowering forsythia bush toward the right. At 1C? It must be wondering why it bothered to wake up.

I promised you some signs.

I liked this Bob Marley observation about music, served up (as t’were) by the Rooster Coffee House on Broadview as its thought-of-the-day. Along with some drink options for humans, and a bowl of water for passing woofs.

You can still make out the words “variety store” above the coffee house entrance, sign of an earlier life — but apparently (and don’t quote me), somewhere in that store’s earlier lives the variety being served up was porn. Aren’t you glad you know that?

Moving on! Physically as well, since this next sign came quite late in my walk, as I headed back toward home along Gerrard St. East. I was at the corner of Howland Rd., deep in one of the city’s Chinatowns, when I saw how Batifole Restaurant chooses to position itself.

Their website offers a further positioning: “to frolic, to romp, to lark, to play about.” Allez-y!

And of course as I walked around, I took photos of murals and tags and other street art. It was only later that I thought how some of those images help illustrate the various stops along my current art/vandalism sliding scale and the questions they raise.

No questions at the far ends, mind — there I’m clear. For example: this mural on the east side of a short alley running south from Danforth, just east of Pape.

A-for-art, for sure. Quite apart from any aesthetic merit, the mural bears logos that tell me it is a commissioned piece of art, the work of the Eastview Neighbourhood Community Centre and the Pape Adolescent Resource Centre.

But how about these two? First, a garage in that same alley, almost directly opposite the mural.

Second, Mr. Blue Dog, high up on the building at the S/E corner of Danforth & Fenwick.

I really liked the dog, I smiled involuntarily when I spottted it. I really didn’t like the garage door, my mouth tightened.

But what’s my justification? For sure, neither was commissioned. In each case, somebody decided to express himself (probably him, not her) on somebody else’s property. One is cute and one isn’t — that’s my defence? Personal taste? Yikes. Not a strong moral ground for judgment.

Two more examples, found on the same little utility building in Kempton Howard Park, at Blake & Strathcona. As I discover, the Eastview Neighbourhood Community Centre is right here, at the south end of the park, and these murals bear the same logos I saw in the Danforth alley. So: commissioned public art. No issues.

There’s a 4-season theme to the mural, as it wraps around the 4 sides of the structure. Here’s summer-going-on autumn…

Circle past the autumn wall, and you come to winter.

Suddenly, I have a question. Those black words dancing across the artwork — are they the work of the artists? Or added by another hand, later on?

I don’t know, I can’t know, but I do know that I react differently depending on the scenario. If the words were added by the artists, I’m happy. If someone else, who had nothing to do with creating the murals, simply decided to “conquer” the space later on, I’m cross.

Another example, this one on Simpson Av. just east of Howland Rd. Now we’re out of the confusing middle zone on my sliding scale, and lodged firmly at the V-for-vandalism end.

That tidy little notice says: “Please don’t tag our barn. Respect. Thank you.”

And the scrawl beside it says: “F*** you.” The work of a lout.

Here is the building he chose to disrespect – the loving, careful restoration of an old horse barn, with its loft for hay and a side learn-to.

And here’s just one glimpse inside the lean-to, with old paint and old tin (I think it is) still there, enriching our present with its witness from our past.

Please do comment on all this, because I am trying to think about it. What should the etiquette be? What should help guide our reactions? I don’t have, and I don’t seek, any easy answers; I don’t think they exist.

I do think, though, that the barn owner focused on one key concept when he asked for ”respect.” Respect for beauty, for loving care, for the public and the civic environment we share. It’s all tied up with the concept of public responsibility. Let us accept that responsibility, and try to live up to it in our daily actions.

And not just in matters of street art…

2 Comments

by icelandpenny on April 22, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged civic morality, Philosophy, street signs, vandalism

Posted by icelandpenny on April 22, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/04/22/streetscape-street-art-plain-old-vandalism/

Intermission on Queen West

19 April — That’s just what it felt like, an intermission. I had a couple of free hours yesterday, between my morning volunteer shift at the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario) and a meeting there late in the afternoon. I did the necessary, worthy things first — had some lunch, reviewed documents for the meeting to come — and then headed out the door for a walk.

Located a bit east of Spadina on Dundas West, the AGO is well placed for a can’t-fail walk in pretty well any direction. Start poking around, you’ll hit old buildings (scruffy or repurposed), new buildings (interesting or banal), and great whacks of street life and street art, some of that art very much alive. As you’ll see.

I turn south on McCaul, headed for Queen, but willing to be diverted.

First diversion, lamb-on-a-bike.

So silly! I love it. Probably belongs to an OCAD (art and design university) student, since I’m passing their main building.

I wander some alleys, say hello to the tandem bike + day-glo bikes I showed you a few posts back (“Random Acts of Bicycle”), and find myself one stub-end of a block to the west, on John St., still above Queen.

Where I meet ‘gator-bike.

He is just one of many bikes in the immediate vicinity. They are all cuddled up close to the Urbane Cyclist Worker Co-op, Est. 1997. All that info is on the sign, and more on the website, where I later learn they are “dedicated to servicing people like ourselves, daily commuters” and a lot of couriers as well. Plus, less expected, they build and service the bicycles for the Toronto Police and other City departments.

I stop at this doorway on Queen West, just east of Soho St. The artwork isn’t advertising any commercial outlet that I can see, it’s just creating an environment for this (I think) walk-up apartment.

She looks sad, and so would you, with a mailbox welded to your cheek. Though I do admire how the 3D object has been incorporated into a 2D mural. Complete with an earring! Maybe the first mailbox to sport an earring.

I look across the street soon after, and pay silent respect to a Queen West landmark on the south side, at Peter. The bistro has been called Peter Pan ever since the present ownership took it over in 1936, but food has been served in this location for more than one hundred years. I remember first going there in the 1960s, and feeling soooo grown-up, hip, cool, downtown, mod… (fill in your own favourite 60s jargon).

But I see something new this time, perhaps because I’m across the street. I cock my head, and I wonder, “How did they do that?” How did anybody manage to paint that perfect horizontal band of street art high on the east-facing wall?

I have visions of particularly athletic graffiti artists rappeling down from the top. Well, maybe they do. I’m not terrifically well-informed about all this.

Looking at my photos later (none with benefit of telephoto), I see there seems to be some kind of ledge.

Which I guess answers my original question but also raises new ones. Beats me.

Meanwhile, back at the walk… I’m still hovering around Queen and Soho/Peter (the street changes name as it crosses Queen), and one more sight demands attention. This time it’s a dead tree trunk turned into art.

This view looks east, back toward Soho; I circle around and find a message on the other side as well.

Heaven knows I’ve been called a tree-hugger in my time, but I settle for a smile and move on.

I’m almost at Spadina when I see something else, and find myself dancing around a streetcar island trying to get an angle for this picture. Truth is, I almost didn’t notice the message at all. It has faded a bit, it’s surrounded by busier and brighter imagery on all sides, but there it is, and a nice man — minding his own business, just waiting for the streetcar — politely moves aside so I can muscle in, hang over the barrier, and do my best.

My best is not so great, but it catches a tribute to a great guy, an icon of our music world, Stompin’ Tom Connors. Dead, as the sidewalk art tells you, earlier this year. Folk, country, what term works? A guy with a rough voice, a guitar, one stompin’ foot, telling our stories. He died a member of the Order of Canada, and I was glad to learn that.

Hit YouTube and the net to learn more about him, and while you’re there, check out the Horseshoe Tavern, there in the background. Oh, the Horseshoe! Originally a blacksmith shop (1861), much more recently described by the Globe and Mail as a “beer-soaked country music bar,” self-described as an “art and music venue since 1947,” and host this year to a couple of Stompin’ Tom tributes.

Fair enough, they hosted him live as well. Along with decades and decades of other names, including Willy Nelson, Waylong Jennings, Loretta Lynn back in the day; then Ian & Sylvia, Bruce Cockburn, The Band, and more; on up through the likes of Blue Rodeo, Prairie Oyster, the Leslie Spit Treo (yes, spelled like that, and how could I of all people not include that name?), Razorback; and now names I don’t recognize, which tells you the Horseshoe knows how to move with the times, and good for them.

I’m delighted by that sidewalk tribute, just delighted, and I’m bouncing with pleasure as I cross at Spadina to head back east on Queen, this time on the south side.

I’m barely east of Spadina when I slow down at one of the shop doorways. It’s not the shop — BorderLine — that attacts me. I stop because, as I very truthfully tell the cheerful young shop reps at the door, “You look amazing.”

I am equally truthful when I demur at their invitation to go inside and buy outfits just like theirs. “”Um, it’s not the real me, you know?” We all laugh. I laugh even more when they call out to a passing, properly be-suited businessman, “You look good, sweetheart!” More like, “sweethahht” because they have Brit accents. Poor man, he looks startled not charmed, and scuttles out of range as quickly as he can.

I start to walk on myself, but turn back. I so want them for this post, and they so agree that they are living, breathing street art. “Vamp for me!” I cry, and they do. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present: Jasmine (left) and Kassandra.

They give good vamp, don’t they? What’s missing is the cheeky humour that animates them when they’re not pulling poses. So unfreeze the image, inject larkiness, and you’ve got J & K. All in all, this amounted to maybe a 5-minute encounter, but such fun.

One more laugh when I get home, do a search, remember they’d told me BorderLine is Facebook not a website, go to Facebook, and discover a big promotion for Torture Garden Weekend 2013 (5th annual). It’s May 17-19, so there’s still time to buy tickets.

Oh good grief, stop that fantasy in its tracks. I will not be there; you know I will not be there. As with the outfits,so with Torture Garden: it’s just not the real me, you know?

CLICK!

Urbane Cyclist Worker Co-op – www.ucycle.com
Peter Pan Bistro – http://peterpanbistro.wordpress.com
Horseshoe Tavern – www.horseshoetavern.com
Torture Garden – http://torturegardentoronto.com

2 Comments

by icelandpenny on April 19, 2013 • Permalink

Posted in Architecture, City, photography, street art, Walking

Tagged bicycles, bistro, BorderLine, country music, fetish wear, Goth, Horseshoe Tavern, Stompin' Tom, Urbane Cyclist

Posted by icelandpenny on April 19, 2013

http://icelandpenny.wordpress.com/2013/04/19/intermission-on-queen-west/

WALKING… & SEEING

"Traveller, there is no path. Paths are made by walking." -- Antonio Machado (1875-1939)

"The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes" -- Marcel Proust (1871-1922)
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WALKING WOMAN

Jalan2 on the 2-4 Weekend

The Lady from Spain… on Dundas Street

400 Backpacks; 5,000 children

The First of Spring… & a “frozen chosen”

Bums on Bronze (& the alphabet, again)

Warmth on the Waterfront (& Jane’s Rule)

Why I Didn’t Get to Balzac’s

The Art of Protest

Streetscape, Street Art… & plain old vandalism

Intermission on Queen West

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