I encourage you all to come to Art Toronto. Besides the incredible amount of art on display, there are a hell of a lot of Marys in this business who would all love to see you.
The fair is about focus. You can’t take it all in. So here are four of my be here and/or be queer fair faves.
Jamie Angell, promoter of art for 14 years on Queen West, shows the work of Alex Macleod, who produces remarkably magical, mixed-media images. His landscapes appear more like dreamscapes, structured yet deconstructed and so beautifully detailed.
Montreal-based Gallery Mûr represents one of my faves, photographer Diana Thorneycroft, who creates critical photographic works dealing with childhood, gender and politics. In her most recent work Thorneycroft uses the Group of Seven’s works as backdrop to out-of-control, hoser skating parties and winter battlefields complete with Tim Horton doughnuts and GI Joes.
Lausberg Contemporary, where I work, is celebrating eight years at the fair and four years on Queen West. From its stellar lineup of minimal artists look for Achim Zeman’s Overflow at the Gladstone. Zeman transforms the heavy Victorian architecture of the hotel into a softened, hyper-real kaleidoscope with hundreds of shiny green vinyl stickers.
Canadian artist Ross Bonfanti, showing with Projects Gallery from Philadelphia, takes your favourite childhood plush toys and casts them in cement. He adds details like old stitching, straw, stuffing, and button eyes. I usually don’t mix toys and art, but they are so convincingly cute.
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