The Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival launches tonight with a party at MOCCA on Queen West. The festival’s theme this year is Public, which is increasingly relevant where people share the intimate details of their private lives online, and the distinction between what is private and public is changing daily.
You don’t have to travel far to experience the festival, although you can as sites range across the city. Lucky for us, many of our local galleries and art spaces are participating.
Oz Studios is part of the action, with “Rotating Reality” running May 6-27 with an opening on May 6, featuring Sandy Baron’s exhibit of playfully altered landscape photographs.
“Glass Ceiling,” Jill Greenberg’s project about the “setup” of being a woman, is opening tonight at O’Born Contemporary and will be running until June 2. (Above, from Jill Greenberg: American Girl Doll, 2010)
Don’t Tell Mama features the Chris Grismer exhibit “New Suburban Photomat,” which explores and plays with new photographic processes to create experimental portraits. The opening is May 5 from 7-10pm, and the exhibit is up through May 31st. (Below, a photo from this exhibit: Superfriends, 2010).
“No Permanent Address” has been showing at Gallery TPW for much of April and garnered acclaim, and the run continues through the festival until May 26. No Permanent Address is a three channel video portrait of the New People’s Army, a Maoist guerrilla group in the Philippines.
“The Nine Eyes of Google Street View,” Angell Gallery‘s offering to Contact, will be sure to draw attention. We’ve all enjoyed the strange unexpected images snapped by Google’s cameras while mapping the world. Jon Rafman’s series compiles “a fascinating array of incidental moments captured by Google’s cameras.” The exhibit opens May 3 from 6-9P until June 2.
If you are enjoying the festival, let us know what you’ve seen and what you recommend seeing.
Every once in a while we are walking down Ossington and taking pictures of some of the places undergoing change, documenting the neighbourhood so we can remember it before the new places arrive. This week we hit up a few places that have changed in the last few weeks since our last post.
Speaking of that last post, one of the places we caught last time was 109 Ossington. This week we saw further transformation from Mundial Autos into the condo sales centre with a new mural. The building has new illustrations by Ian Keltie and were painted by Toronto-based muralist William Lazos.
We thought we would post this fun poster left over from the now closed Viva Salon (where More Than Pasta is), advertising their tanning services. We know the folks at 109 will probably take this one down very soon.
At the northeast side of Ossington, there is now a full-on strip of restaurants worth archiving. Starting just below the CIBC, are Yours Truly, The Saint Tavern, Salt Wine Bar, Pizza Libretto, Alex Rei, and Fishbar. So much great food in this one short stretch!
The location north of Levack Block has been undergoing a transformation. Connecting the spots between Levack and (now closed) Paramour, this once empty space seems likely to add another retailer to the northeast corner of Ossington and Humbert.
Spotted at 80 Ossington: A liquor license application for Mamakas Bakery. Formerly the home of Ministry of Interior, the space is now covered in drawings offering hints about the new inhabitant. A google search yielded minimal results, so all we know is what we know on the signs which is the application for a license for a Greek Bakery and these clever drawings.
Can anyone give us more hints into this Greek mystery? At this point it really is all Greek to us.
The event is being held to raise awareness about environmental improvements, and to allow residents to easily dispose of used, unwanted and hazardous household materials. Some may be reused and/or recycled, and others will just be disposed of properly.
What else do you get if you attend? There will be a barbecue (hosted by Friends of Roxton Road Parks), and you can pick up some free compost from your garden. Also available for purchase are backyard composters, green bins and kitchen containers. Details here.
Go to the park tomorrow, Saturday, April 14 between 10a-2p to participate.
Last night we got to try the newly opened Bellwoods Brewery at 124 Ossington, formerly home to Rolly’s Garage and Meta Gallery.
Bellwoods Brewery is a micro-brewery and cafe, serving beers and snacks currently created by Chef Guy Rawlings, already known to the neighborhood from his stint at Brockton General.
The beer list is on a chalkboard over the bar, and features several in-house brewed beers of varying alcohol contents, all detailed on the card. The food menu offers assorted snacks and finger foods, or as they call it, “picnic” foods.
Last night was opening night, and they will be open at night from Monday through Sunday. More details here.
You can see Now Magazine‘s Audience Choice Winners Peter ’n Chris at LOT on Friday at 8PM. Their show, Peter ‘n Chris and the Mystery of the Hungry Heart Hotel is a “ridiculous mash-up of genres including horror, adventure and mystery”
At 9:30 on Friday, Falcon Powder presents a full-length version of “Cowboys,” featuring some of the sketches that made them the Second City Best of The Fest winners in 2011, and some new material.
On top of Monday’s launch of The Saint Tavern, last night we fortuitously happened upon the opening of Hawker Bar at 164 Ossington. Yes, Hawker Bar opened their doors in a soft opening for friends and family to make sure everything worked and try out their creative Singapore “street food” cuisine. They haven’t received their license yet due to some neighborhood teetotalers who have slowed the process. But that hasn’t stopped them from wanting to open their doors and showcase their food.
Don’t worry about the lack of liquor! The ambience, food flavours, and creative “mocktails” the staff served were more than enough! The menu is a work in progress, with a mix of affordable snacks, mains and even a couple of interesting desserts. We tried a couple of snacks, including a light and refreshing cucumber salad and some pork satays, and concluded with a shaved ice dessert with black bean and corn sauce which was a delightful combination of sweet and savoury.
Hawker Bar will officially open for dinner tonight with lunch hours coming soon. According to a recent tweet, their April hours are:
After many years of building (for them) and waiting (for us), The Saint Tavern is now open. After a few nice articles in Toronto Life, they got another one today announcing their opening. On the night of the Jays home opener we headed over to grab some dinner and were pleasantly surprised that we could keep watching the game on their big screen TVs and try out some food. We were particularly impressed with the diversity of the menu. It’s a place where you can feast on a $70 porterhouse steak, snack on $5 pickles, slurp on fresh oysters, or have a main course at a price point anywhere in between. The drink list includes a range of local beers, creative cocktails and a wide selection of scotches and other whiskey.
We only sampled the bone marrow, pickled vegetables and Nicoise salad but will be heading back soon to try more. Go try it yourself!
The lot at 109 Ossington, previously occupied by Mundial Auto Repairs, is soon to be developed into lofts by Reserve Properties, who have just released artist renderings of the design.
Reserve Properties is also behind nearby Motif Lofts. The new property, called 109OZ, is already attracting attention in the press. The sentence fragments on their website are meant to express a mood:
“These inspired lofts veer towards the unexpected. With a clean modern aesthetic complete with organically stacked profile and vibrant splashes of colour. This is unquestionably, undeniably Ossington.”
We got more information from Reserve Properties, who inform us that the finished building will feature 85 lofts with open concept layouts. Almost every suite will have private outdoor space and European kitchens. A main selling point is, of course, the opportunity to live in a neighborhood with great dining, arts and energy.
Layouts will be one or two bedroom lofts, and prices start at the high $200,000′s. This property is being developed at Ossington south of Argyle, on the east side of the street, just south of More than Pasta.
As you can see every day walking down Ossington, many of the buildings are transforming – changing to condos, retail spaces, breweries, fine-dining restaurants, and more. Over the weekend we took some photos of some of the places in transition so we can look back in a year or more and remember how the street used to be.
Motif – This development has been in transition for a while. Recently they got approval to build more housing further down Rebecca St.
Hawker Bar – Between I Deal Coffee and the Downtown Lumber the folks at Hawker Bar are in the midst of a transformation to creating a Singapore dining experience.
109 Ossington – In the location where Mundial Auto Repairs (and auto sales) and a Portuguese social club used to reside, a new condominium cluster is going to arise. I have never noticed the crenelation on the top of the old social club.
Bellwoods Brewery - In the old location of Rolly’s Garage and Meta Gallery, the folks at Bellwoods Brewery have been hard at work transforming the location. We’re looking forward to sipping a pint of brew on a warm summer night on their front patio.
38-42 Ossington – This was a group of residences which seems to be vacant and has had wood scaffolding out front for the last few months. Does anyone know what’s going to appear here?
