This row of old two storey row houses has been vacant for years. Recently the developer that owns the properties provided a couple of Toronto artists the opportunity paint the exterior. This is the result.
If you look carefully, you can see that Nick Sweetman and Luvs (aka Moises) have painted the word CHANGE across the front of the buildings. As a theme for a mural on a redevelopment site in a city bursting at the seams with such sites, change seems very appropriate.
below: I’ve played with the colours a bit to highlight some of the letters. You should be able to see C, H, and A across this image.
But the mural is more than colour and letters. There are three animals featured here – pigeon, raccoon, and coyote – all of which have adapted to changes and now thrive in urban environments.
below: by Nick Sweetman – two ebony jewelwings, a male and female along with a partially submerged frog with its tongue ready for action. Jewelwings are a species of damselfly.
‘Out and About – Windows of Time’ is a large mural by Christiano De Araujo that features scenes from the social history of Weston village. Unfortunately, the (painted) young man who is sitting on the sidewalk and playing a guitar is hidden by the (real) car parked in front of the mural.
January 23rd is Lunar New Year as we enter the Year of the Rabbit (except in Vietnam where apparently it’s the Year of the Cat).
below: Although this mural has nothing to do with rabbits (or cats), it is found in Toronto’s Chinatown. Three dragons cavorting on the wall on Oxford Street, painted by sightone in 2016.
below: Blue dragon guarding the door at number 5.
Nearby there is an alley where the Chinatown BIA has sponsored some murals with Asian themes.
below: A large koi, or carp, swimming towards a pink lotus flower.
below:“Flowers of the four seasons – Autumn Chrysanthemum” by rowdyradrat.
below: Another rowdyradrat painting – this one is “Flowers of the Four Seasons – Winter, Plum Blossoms” and it features Chinese plum blossoms.
There is a railway bridge that crosses Lansdowne Ave just south of Dundas West. Along the concrete wall on the east side of the underpass is a long stretch of murals painted last year by a group of muralists and street artists. This is “Community Built”.
below: At the south end of paintings…. Ducks and loons in the water; ducks in flight by Nick Sweetman. Most people will recognize the green-headed mallard; the duck with the big black and white head is a male hooded merganser. A female merganser has a similar crest on her head except that it is brown.
Next to the ducks there are people fishing and wading in a creek. This portion was painted by Elicser Elliott.
below: Under the tracks, abstract flowers in yellows and oranges by Chris Perez
below: Black hands and white hands reaching out, by Rowell Soller
below: Kedre Brown (left) and Artchild (right)
below: Scenes on light green by Andrea Manica – a dog, a bee, and a couple of strawberries – walking in heels with coat and hat – sitting on a yellow blanket – a tent, mushrooms, and playing ball.
below: As the years go by we’ll be able to date the artworks of 2020 to 2022 by the presence of masks. That’s assuming that we won’t be wearing them again…..
below: Under a rainbow where nature thrives in a collaboration between Shawn Howe and Mo Thunder.
below: Part of the RUN Collective, is Ren Lonechild who painted the mother sasquatch with her little ones at the bottom of the stairs. Swooping and swirling around the apes and the stairs are ghostly creatures that are the work of Cedar Eve Peters
below: The view from the top of the stairs from Shirley Avenue
below: A mural with a message that the willow tree is nature’s aspirin. Willow bark contains salicin which is chemically similar to aspirin which also known as acetylsalicylic acid. The salicin chemical structure is shown in this mural by Keitha Keeshing-Tobias.
below: This project incorporated a previous public art installation on this site. Back in 1989 a number of small sculptures, or forms, by Dyan Marie were embedded into the wall of the underpass.
below: This is Leone McComas’s contribution to the ‘Community Built’ project
below:Alex Bacon painted dancers in hazy flowing shades of pink and orange.
below: Two murals.
below: Close up of the cyclist painted by Curtia Wright
below: On the right – a blue woman reclines by a cluster of colourful houses. She’s got one hand on a pink lawn and her feet on a red lawn under a white-leafed tree. This mural was painted by Yasaman Mehrsa.
below: Close up view of the big regal cat by Planta Muisca as it sits on a blue mat by a bowl of papaya and a slice of lemon.
below: Welcome to Little Tibet … standing beside a white chicken by Caitlin Taguibao
below: People from the Little Tibet mural, by Kalsang Wangyal,
below: A mural by Tenzin Tsering on the right – a bonfire where “the flames of the bonfire represent the tradition of oral storytelling and act as a homage to the diverse and unique stories/voices of the people in Tkaronto.” (from her instagram page)
below: And what’s a Toronto mural if it doesn’t have a raccoon?
In the mural two pictures above, the painting on the left is the work of Jordan McKie (aka trip2thetop) The next few images are from that mural.
below: A dragon’s head at the north end of the underpass by June Kim.
below: Looking south
A Mural Routes project from 2021
June, Jordan McKie, Tenzin Tsering, Kalsang Wangyal (waz_graphics), Caitlin Taguibao, Planta Muisca, Yasaman Mehrsa, kaya joan, Curtia Wright, Alex Bacon, Leone McComas, Keitha Keeshig-Tobias Biizindam, Red Urban Nation Artists Collective (Drew Rickard, Danielle Hyde, Cedar Eve Peters, Ren Lonechild and Que Rock), Mo Thunder and Shawn Howe, Andrea Manica, Kedre Brown, ARTCHILD, Rowell Soller, Chris Perez, Elicser Elliott, Nick Sweetman.
Curator and community engagement facilitator: Bareket Kezwer
Along a wall beside the playground at 103 and 105 West Lodge is a mural painted by Elicser Elliot and Nick Sweetman a couple of years ago. It’s theme is the outdoors and it includes scenes like kids playing baseball, people reading and sitting outside enjoying themselves, as well as people planting gardens and admiring the flowers. There are also lots of animals – a large dragonfly shows off its wings, bees fly by, squirrels hoard nuts, a robin pulls a pink worm out of the ground, and a very large hedgehog sniffs the flowers.
below: Hedgehog covered with thousands of protective spikes.
below: Playing baseball and keeping an eye on the bees
below: An encounter with a skunk
below: Playing with friends. Great dunk shot!
below: This robin has found very large worm
below: A blue dragonfly with translucent wings
below: A black squirrel and a grey squirrel and thousands of nuts!
The people in the mural scenes were painted by Elicser Elliott while Nick Sweetman painted the animals.
“Almonds and Wine” was a short (5 minute) animated film by Arnie Lipsey. It is the retelling of a Yiddish folk song about a wedding of a couple from Eastern Europe. In the film the newlyweds emigrate to Canada and become part of Toronto’s Jewish community. In turn, their children grow up, marry, and have their own children.
Using scenes from the film, a mosaic mural was created that now lines a section of sidewalk on Bathurst Street. It was designed to look like a strip of film with black lines between the frames as well as the sprockets along the edges.
Mosaic Artist: Cristina Delago. The mural was completed in 2010.
In an alley near Dovercourt and Queen West in Toronto are two garage door murals unlike any others.
below: ‘Elephancy’ by Zirco Fish – It’s an elephant but it’s not. Tusks like an elephant and the ears seem to be big a floppy. But the mouth is like a beak and the eyes are certainly not those of an elephant. A crazy fantastical creature, the product of someone’s imagination.
Eyes on the Streets 