Bloor and Lansdowne is changing. As art galleries move in, new businesses follow, making the area more attractive to middle-class people looking for a place to live. This leads to questions about gentrification and the future of the working-class and poor people who have until now made the area home.
It's appropriate therefore that this weekend's BIG on Bloor festival includes an art work by recent OCAD-grad and dd/mm/yyyy band member Matt King that touches on the touchy subject of gentrification. Called the Balloon Room Room, this participatory piece will be annhomanART's contribution to CultureWorks.
Matt King writes:
For the Bloor Improvement Group’s street festival, I have decided to create a balloon stand where I will sell balloons for one dollar. These balloons will have a ‘1$’ written on them with a black marker. Much like other balloons, these will be used to advertise, but not for a product. My balloons advertise one's ability to spend their money on useless hunks of gas and plastic. Above this balloon stand will be a replica of a small child hanging from a seemingly runaway pile of helium balloons. This will be used as a promotional spectacle as well as a metaphorical statement about excess.
In the economic revitalization plan on the festival's website, there is no mention of a plan to deal with the impending gentrification of the area, but rather the acknowledgement of its presence and possible effects. From this I have come to understand there is no practical way to prevent this process of gentrification from happening. As an artist participating in this festival (whether I comment or not on this impending gentrification), by simply participating, I am contributing to this change. In this, my project simply points out the process of consumerism on this commercial strip. Regardless of the businesses’ clientele, one's participation in this ‘community’ is through the process of consumption. Had this event taken place in a park, the concept of the festival would be dramatically altered.
I have written about annhomanART before. I know Ann through DIG IN and I have come to admire her gutsiness. It takes courage to launch a new business and to perservere in a tough field.
Ann describes her art enterprise this way:
annhomanART is an evolving project which combines a salon gallery with site-specific art events. The salon hosts the ongoing Emerging Artist series, which continues into the 2009/2010 season. Site-specific art events designed by emerging artists include Andy Morris's WindowShopping, part of the independent project Bloor Nightlight at the 2007 Nuit Blanche, and Frances Beatty's 21 Polaroids at the first BIG on Bloor Festival in 2008.
Ann is also lead producer for Bloor-Lansdowne's second independent Nuit Blanche project, Funktion Function. Aside from annhomanART, the other partners in what Ann calls "a take back the night event", are the Bloordale BIA, DIG IN and Funktion Gallery. I should also note that Ann is a member of the Steering Committee for the Toronto Biennale or TOB1.
