Pink Bikes of Toronto

The pink bikes have survived the wrath of the City and have multiplied. I think they bring some much needed vibrancy to the downtown core and they don't mark up anyone's walls. This one is on Yonge Street.

Silver Elvis on black velvet

Silver Elvis was on station outside the Eaton Centre, shaking the pelvis and being all reflecty. At the same time - the same time I say, there was an artist painting Silver Elvis on a what could only resemble black velvet (I don't know if this is the artist of the famous dogs playing poker painting) using Silver Elvis' silver guitar - the paintbrush was attached to the end of the guitar.

Kittens and the man on the wall

Kitten on a pole for box of kittens on a boat. A poster of a man peels gently on the brick supports of a park covered picnic area down in Coronation Park.

Graffiti demonstration at Yonge Street

There was a graffiti artist giving a demonstration on a large white canvas at the intersection of Yonge and Dundas in Toronto today. I like to think that the white canvas was actually cut from a building and will soon be stapled back in place.

And as a bonus here is a panorama of the comings and goings of the intersection while the paint was being sprayed.

Giant Toronto Inuksuk

This giant Toronto Inuksuk came together along Lake Shore Boulevard, just beside Ontario Place, in celebration of World Youth Day in 2002. The stone structure is a landmark made for various purposes and has come to symbolize the vast northern territories of Canada and it's peoples that live in the harsh lands.

I post the photo in celebration of our friend Goretti Kakuktinniq from Rankin Inlet. Goretti works with the Nunavut Development Corporation (NDC) and she recently went to Paris to promote Inuit art.

Banksy: cop and pink balloon

It's been over a year since Banksy blew into town, a mysterious artist hiding his identity, letting his art speak for him (well, some art and a movie). While some of his graffiti works remain, I don't think anything survived untouched. The Lake Shore Boulevard painting of the police officer holding back a floating, pink balloon dog is still there with only the modifications that were done soon after the art went up - namely the dog's Grrr!, the white highlight with the vulture on top of the cop's head and the yellow "Robbin' BANKSY". You can see the original here on BlogTO and one of my post of the paintings here.

What I find fascinating is that the painting is still pretty pristine, other than the above noted additions, yet the barrels that were beside the graffiti still remain, rusting. I mean who leaves barrels outside like that? I think that it's something out of the Simpsons - they are full of spent nuclear fuel or toxic waste. I think Banksy realized the danger of these barrels - his dog was trying to get to the bad waste.

Trash

Toronto ships it's trash elsewhere and the big city is currently looking at contracting out garbage collection. A lot of our trash is in the streets, taped to poles in every growing diameters. We could save money by just putting up a simple frame for just about everything, later the poster people would glue and tape on the structure, from phone booths to buildings, nothing is to big for the poster people.

Hockey Hall of Fame

I haven't actually gone into the Hockey Hall of Fame, I think it is because that if it has stuff from when the Leafs were any good I wouldn't want to be around all those dusty antiques! They do have a beautiful building with a great location at Yonge and Front Streets and they also have a 17 foot bronze statue titled 'Our Game' by Edie Parker in front of the building.

'Our Game' bronze sculpture.

Chalk in the streets

As the temperatures warm up the buskers return to the streets of Toronto. Outside the Eaton Centre at Yonge and Dundas a chalk artist starts a large drawing on the sidewalk as even the pigeons gather for a view of the bright, colourful art.

Banksy in the alley

Banksy's Toronto graffiti still survives, barely, in a few places. Luckily he picked the right alley on Church Street because the building next door looks like it is coming down, while the second one away is down - done like dinner, nothing left but the splinters.

I was surprised to see that the Church Street Keg Restaurant has moved out of it's old building and into a new home on The Esplanade. I worked in that Keg for one night covering their staff party night - that's right I used to work for the Keg (Mississauga (the old Dixie-Dundas Keg) and the Brampton (the old downtown Brampton Keg)). Sadly, I just noticed that all my old Keg Restaurants are gone! I met and married my wife when we worked at the Keg and I have a ton of great memories from those days. Rock on Keg Staff.

Photo Vault - do the wave

GIF animations generator gifup.com

The art installation the Watertable under the Gardiner Expressway.

Graffiti on the walls

Artists and gangs tag the walls wherever they have even the slightest access. Cans of spray paint litter the alley, leftover from a day of painting. The artists get mad when taggers wreck their work.

Someone adds a graphic symbol to the graffiti mural.

Most of the graffiti is stylized words and letters, a vomit of colours and easily forgettable. Along railway tracks and in long alleyways the words tell a story that is hard to decipher.

Sometimes graffiti is simple and shares a message.

And sometimes it is cute.

Posters in the street

Posters fill many of the building surfaces along the downtown core of Toronto, some in places where they should be - such as the special light poles, and some on anything that doesn't move. The posters go up in such numbers that they soon are inches thick. Weathered posters become torn in patchwork quilts and take on a life of their own.

Most of the posters are advertisements, some even advertisements for poster companies.

Kill Nuisance - Clast SPVM

A cartoon character gets ready to spray poison to kill some nuisance, seen on a construction barrier on Yonge Street. He could be a giant because he is eating someone and their head is sticking out of his teeth.

Murals on Dundas

Driving along Dundas Street West in the Village of Islington your eye catches the large murals on the side of several buildings on both sides of the busy road. The large paintings take over the building facade and show different scenes of life a from a time long time ago.

Some of the paintings show colours found in old black and white photographs and some of the paintings show bright, vibrant colours that really grab your attention. The outdoor gallery has been gathering quite the publicity and you can enjoy them as you travel on Dundas Street West from Kipling to Islington. Take a chance and stop to look at the detail in the paintings and the story that they tell.

The paintings also have plaques that tell a bit about the story behind the painting. You can also find more information on line if you want even more details - like story about the WWII bomber that buzzed a rugby game and ended up dropping leaflets onto a farm field.

You can see more of the amazing murals after the jump.

X marks the spot

Update: As some readers have told me the symbols are bowling related and in fact they are promoting a new bowling alley called the Ballroom. There entertainment will include not only bowling lanes but also ping pong tables.

X marks the spot and X marks the turkey. Sometimes strange things happen in Toronto, sometimes you figure out why, other times you scratch your head and go on with life. Large white posters featuring X's and slashes are appearing on poles and boxes along Bay Street and other streets.

Toronto might finally be getting it's rating; parental guidance may be required. Two other X's and everyone can walk around naked having sex in the streets.

What a headache looks like

I always imagined that this is what a headache should look like. Or maybe it is what you would like to do to your head while suffering through a bad migraine.

Graffiti and Reflection

The alleys off of Queen Street West are full of vibrant graffiti, some artful and some just mean tags. It seems like a pretty tough place with so many gates and fences and the ever present spray painted surfaces. I think most of the spray paint used in Toronto is along the alleys adjacent to Queen Street West. They say that "Graffiti Alley" runs south of Queen Street from Spadina to Portland. You can also visit the torontograffiti.com site to view some more graffiti and even hire a graffiti artist.

The city also has a lot of windows so you can find some interesting reflections of the streetscape, especially the popular CN Tower, staring right at you. Although sometimes you need to catch the tower at night when it is lit up in a changing kaleidoscope of colours.

The District

The historic District of Distillery, sort of the like the District of Columbia, sits in the east side of downtown Toronto and keeps getting better with age (some call it the Distillery District). The condos bring more people into the area filling the many cafes and shops in the bricky neighbourhood. Here are some people (pictured above) with long poles cleaning windows. They are doing a lot of construction work on the east side of the District near Cherry Street for the Clear Spirit Condominium.

The large sculpture which I call the egg beaters near the centre of the District is up and you can see the installation being assembled beside the Pump House on my earlier post here. The sculpture is called "Still Dancing" by artist Dennis Oppenheim. You can also see more of the sculptures, some of them pretty wild and crazy, on this post. And who could forget the lovable plastic penguin with his little red hat that could be found outside on the streets, I haven't seen him for awhile, I hope he is not lost.

This great little area will play host to some of the Nuite Blanche works on October 2, 2010. Next time you are close stop by the Brick Street Bakery and enjoy some refreshments and the relaxing atmosphere or consider the Mill Street Brewpub or the Pure Spirits Oyster House & Grill (seen below).