It’s frustrating that the powers that be in Toronto seem to have such little interest in placing value on arts and culture.

A billboard by the Economist. The light is triggered by a motion sensor. Image: objectivemarketer.com

Sure, we’ve got Nuit Blanche and the amazing Luminato festival, both of which are truly wonderful, but when it comes to an innovative 8-year-long project by the arts community to get billboard taxes put towards beautifying the city, which we blogged about HERE, the city says no go.

And yet:

-According to Spacing magazine, every member of the Budget Committee expressed their support for a billboard tax that would fund art and public realm enhancements.

-Apparently, The new tax was justified in staff and consultant reports, public consultations, city press releases, over 45 times in Council and through a wide variety of media outlets.

-Over 4500 people have signed a petition of support and over 60 organizations have endorsed BeautifulCity.ca

-What’s more, a McKinsey and Co. study in 2006 found that “for every 1 dollar of public arts funding in a regional economy, 8 are generated.”

And yet, we hear that it was recently recommended at Council that zero new money now go to enhancing public spaces with art.

(This recent action suggests that) “They have no faith in the future of Toronto’s creative youth,” says No. 9 founder Andrew Davies, whose public art organization endorses Beautifulcity.ca.

It would have been an opportunity to look to the city’s future, to create vibrant public spaces that enhance property values, boost tourism, give something visible back to residents and will help build the city for the long-term.

What a shame.

Last night, we went to the preview of the Gladstone Hotel’s alternative design event, Come Up To My Room (CUTMR). We’ve been in the past, and this year was by far the best. Each room on the hotel’s second floor was individually transformed, many with inspiring and conceptually tight installations.

Thu, Jan 21, 2010 – Sun, Jan 24, 2010
12:00 pm – 8:00 pm
$8

Here are some highlights:

1. Orest Tataryn and Bruno Billio

This was our favorite installation. A ray of neon light zooms wildly around a carefully decorated room where two chandeliers have collided. It’s wonderful, and can be re-created to commission.

Click HERE to contact the artists.

There are many more photos after the jump….

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If you’re in Toronto, have you noticed these strange statues popping up all over town? Advertising uses the language of art!

The Wind Mobile ad, in front of the Black Bull pub at the corner of Queen and Soho Streets.
Image: VoCA

Created in the same vein of Molson’s legendary campaign, Joe Canadian’s “Rant”, this statue is pitched as an ode to the average Canadian. It’s an ad by Wind Mobile. Citing the cyber identities of three people who have commented on its blog asking for better deals for mobile phone customers, the statue “commemorates Flippy, Mr. Ideas, Flowergal and the thousands of other Canadians who rose up against an unresponsive mobile industry.”

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LOATHED: THIS article by Toronto architecture critic Christopher Hume tells of a developer who skirted the law by hiring thugs to deface a building that was slated for heritage protection. Now the building can’t be designated, so he’s able to just tear it down.

Gordon Matt-Clark, Conical Intersect, 1974-5. Image: thesprawlnetwork.com

Such little respect for our architectural heritage is astounding.

A more interesting option would have been to put out a call to artists to make work out of the old building. At least then it would ‘die’ with respect. Something similar to the excellent show the Leona Drive Project, which we blogged about HERE. That show was the result of a collaboration between developers and curators that gave soon-to-be-demolished houses over to artists for a week.

An image from the Leona Drive Project in Toronto. Image: Derek Flack/blogto.com

Of course, using architecture as art has been done by the late, great Gordon Matta-Clark, an artist who famously split houses in two, transforming their meaning from living space to wonder-inducing sculpture.

It reminds us of the young trees lining Toronto’s Bloor Street that were brutally beheaded last week to make room for other trees, with more soil, that will grow larger. Was it really necessary to kill all those trees? We hear they were mostly healthy.

One of the beheaded trees on Bloor Street. Image: Remi Carreiro/Torontoist

Let’s look for creative, positive solutions to such issues. After all, according to Seth Godin and others, we are entering the age of generosity.

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Thanks to Gareth Bate from whom we got Hume’s story on Facebook.

Tibi Tibi Neuspiel, Lincoln / Booth. Image: beautifuldecay.com

For those of you who are interested in the ‘what is art criticism’ debate, there’s recently been a lively discussion among my fellow Canadian bloggers, sparked by THIS post that VoCA wrote a few weeks ago.

Check out Gabby Moser’s blog HERE for her thoughts, Jennifer McMackon’s blog Simpleposie HERE, for another discussion, and Leah Sandals, who shares her thoughts on her great blog, Unedit My Heart, right HERE.

This summer, VoCA set off to find a hidden sculpture by the great American sculptor Richard Serra, which was installed almost 40 years ago in a field near King City, outside of Toronto.  Read our earlier post about the piece HERE.

Shift, in wintertime. Image: slowpainting.com

Image: mcgill.ca

Now, according to the Globe and Mail, “an important and controversial vote is expected to be taken Monday by councillors…on the fate of a meandering outdoor cement installation.”

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Bruno Billio, Samba Mochet, 2002. Image courtesy the artist.

We love this sculpture by Toronto artist Bruno Billio.  It’s made from a carpet and 2 pairs of old Adidas Samba trainers.  It’s very suggestive, it’s funny, it’s sculptural and it’s simple.  We love how Billio is always re-thinking the most common materials.

Only an Italian would have made it.

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Last night we saw Enjoy Poverty at Hot Docs, the documentary film festival currently on in Toronto.

The neon sign. Image: fadwebsite.com

Seeing as how it was sponsored by the Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, we were surprised to recognize only two artists – Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak – in the audience.

The film sees Dutch artist Renzo Martens travel through the Congo armed with a camera and an enormous neon sign that reads, in English, ‘Enjoy Poverty (please)’, which he erects at various intervals amid desperately poor Congolese villagers.

There’s something incredibly uncomfortable about watching someone with his own agenda filming the tragedy of poverty stricken Africa. He befriends the villagers and interviews them about the difficulty of their situation, their malnourished children and the fact that they barely make enough to get by.

They put their trust in him, but his own agenda (to put up his signs in their villages) is entirely foreign to them. Even as he explains to them that their situation is unlikely to change, the bewilderment on their faces is clear. He’s here, what can they do? To the audience it verges on a kind of exploitation.

Until you realize what’s really going on.

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This just in: An email from Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty and Aileen Carroll, Ontario Minister of Culture announcing their brand new initiative:

NOTE: VoCA has made a (very rare) mistake. We were so appalled by the possibility, that we neglected to notice that although the email we received appeared to have been sent by the Ontario government, it was in fact sent by ARTS AGENCY, an association of artists and communications management experts who think this re-branding of Ontario is a good idea. More info on Arts Agency HERE.

A survey to determine whether the province of Ontario should have a cultural nickname, wait for it….
Artcity Ontario.

A possible branding strategy for the province of Ontario. Classy, no? Image: artsagency.com

They say: “The purpose of the cultural nickname is to increase cultural tourism to Ontario.”

VoCA says: We would much rather see the McGuinty government step up commitment to the arts directly rather than spend money on cheesy branding strategies. Ontario – and Toronto in particular – hasn’t exactly been a whiz at branding itself (Toronto Unlimited, anyone?) We’d rather see the name ‘Ontario’ stand on its own as a province where the government supports culture.

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After he launched Stuart, a social networking and portfolio showcase site for artists, and just when we were wondering what Charles Saatchi would get up to next, we’re entirely unsurprised by what he’s done. He’s launching a sort of Big Brother-slash-American Idol for emerging artists.

The world of young contemporary art(stardom) is already a circus by any measure, so why not declare it such with a reality television show?

Collector, ad man and UK celebrity Charles Saatchi. Image: artespain.com

Of course, it’s not the first art-related reality show. In 2006, New York dealer Jeffrey Deitch launched Artstar on Gallery HD, a specialty 24-hour channel devoted to the visual arts. Click HERE for the website and HERE for the New York Times’ take on the show.

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