What does Canada sound like? Is it possible to capture the essence of an entire nation through sound?

Mitchell Akiyama tackled this topic in a recent CANADALAND podcast that revisited a 1974 CBC broadcast made up of field recordings from across the country. The 10-hour episode, which aired on Ideas, attempted to encapsulate the country's acoustic environment.

An Assistant Professor who teaches in the Daniels Faculty’s Visual Studies programs, Akiyama’s eclectic body of work includes writings about plants, animals, cities, and sound art; scores for film and dance; and objects and installations that trouble received ideas about history, perception, and sensory experience. He is currently a SSRHC Postdoctoral Fellow at York University’s Sensorium Centre for Digital Arts & Technology.

The full episode, “That Time the CBC Aired 10 Hours of Crickets and Church Bells,” is available through CANADALAND’s website.

Photo, top: The World Soundscape Project group at SFU, 1973; left to right: R. M. Schafer, Bruce Davis, Peter Huse, Barry Truax, Howard Broomfield

Presented by the Art Museum at the University of Toronto, and curated by Yan Wu (MVS-Curatorial 2016), MAKING MODELS is an exciting new project that brings together architecture and art, staged to advance innovative and critical ideas in experimental architecture in Toronto.
 
Nine Toronto architecture studios and artist groups — which include a number of Daniels Faculty members and alumni — have been invited to propose ideas and prototypes in model form that foster analytical, conceptual, physical and tectonic frameworks for inhabiting and constructing urban space and the public sphere. Produced in various scales that involve speculative, functional, representational and/or relational approaches, these architectural models, in response to the theme “meet me there”, take as their point of departure an exemplary public space – the Sir Daniel Wilson quad, an outdoor courtyard and urban oasis located on the downtown campus of the University of Toronto.
 
The nine proposal models will be on display as a group exhibition MAKING MODELS at the Art Museum from September 6 - October 7, 2017. A select jury composed of art and architectural professionals and university students will choose one model to be realized in 1:1 size on site at the Sir Daniel Wilson quad, in dialogue with the quad’s complex network of movement, vegetation, infrastructure, furniture, and architecture. The installation will be on display from September 21 - November 25, 2017.  The winning model will be announced in August 2017.
 
The nine Toronto architecture studios and artist groups participating in MAKING MODELS include CN Tower Liquidation, LAMAS (the firm of Assistant Professor Vivian Lee and Lecturer James Macgillivray, Lateral Office (the firm of Associate Professor Mason White), Nestor Kruger and Yam Lau, Assistant Professor's Mitchell Akiyama and Brady Peters, Public Studio, studio junction (the firm of alumni Peter Tan and Christine Ho Ping Kong, both BArch 1996) , Terrarea (an art collective that includes Emily Hogg, MLA 2003; Janis Demkiw, and Olia Mishchenko), and UUfie.
 
The five noted professional jurors are Alex Bozikovic (Architecture critic, The Globe and Mail), Tom Dean (artist), Bruce Kuwabara (Founding Partner, KPMB Architects), November Paynter (Director of Programs, Museum of Contemporary Art Toronto Canada), and Irene Sunwoo (Curator, Arthur Ross Architecture Gallery; Director of Exhibitions, Columbia University GSAPP).
 
While the city continues to experience unprecedented urban growth, especially in the area of generic condominium towers, there is also a chronic absence of major exhibitions and public forums for serious, in-depth considerations of the role that architecture plays in the shaping of the urban environment. MAKING MODELS provides a rare and coveted opportunity for established and emerging architects and artists to develop experimental and speculative approaches toward the built environment for broader public consideration.

Model Proposals
September 6 – October 6, 2017
University of Toronto Art Centre
—
1:1 Model Installation
September 21 – November 25, 2017
Sir Daniel Wilson Quad, St George Campus (map)

A number of artists affiliated with the Daniels Faculty will be participating in this year’s Gladstone Grow Op exhibition at the Gladstone Hotel. The annual event celebrates innovative ideas in the fields of landscape architecture, garden design, art, and place-making. Using video, sound performance, photography, new media, animal parts, the human body, and more, Grow Op promises to make us think differently about the landscapes that shape our cities and our cities’ relationship to the land. This year’s exhibition was juried by Andrea Mantin (MLA 2009), Victoria Taylor (MLA 2008), Layne Hilton, and Graham Teeple.

Daniels students, alumni, and faculty participating in the 2017 Gladstone Grow Op include Jordan Duke and Dayne Roy-Caldwell (both MLA 2016), Katie Lawson (current MVS-Curatorial student), D & S Projects — the firm of alumna Katie Strang (MLA 2015) and Christine Dewancker — Lecturer Shadi Ramos (MLA 2010), and PseudoStudio — the firm of Greg Bunker and Shira Davis (both MLA 2013).

Other artists include David Ballantine, Melanie Billark, Bruno Billio, Liam Blackwell, Micah Donovan, Agnieszka Forfa, Eve Gane, Julie Gladstone, Martha Barron Griffith, Monica Gutierrez, John Haney, Byron Hodgins, Rebecca Jane Houston, Hayden King and Susan Blight, Aisling O’Carroll & Sara Jacobs, Olga Klosowski, Becky Lauzon, Lindy Wilkins & Dushan Milic, Michelle Hunniford & Magdalena Milosz, Kate & Claire Nelischer, Rachel Grice & Rekha Ramachandran, Safiya Randera, Daniel Ranger, Miles Rufelds, and The Urban Apothecary.

Grow Op takes place April 19 to 23, with an Opening Reception on Friday, April 21. For more information, visit the 2017 Gladstone Grow Op website.

Photo, top: Urban Hermit Retrospective by Greg Bunker and Shira Davis

cheyanne turions (MVS 2016) had already established a name for herself as a curator before beginning her Masters of Visual Studies in Curatorial Studies at the Daniels Faculty. With exhibitions in artist-run centres and arts organizations across Canada — including Art Metropole in Toronto, the Western Front in Vancouver, and SBC Gallery in Montréal — her work has been recognized as “highly considered and articulated” as well as “relevant, provocative, risky, and ambitious.” In 2015, she received the Award for Emerging Curator of Contemporary Canadian Art from the Hnatyshyn Foundation and TD Band Group, and the Reesa Greenberg Curatorial Studies Award. Honours Bachelor of Arts in Architectural Studies student Josie Northern Harrison (HBA 2017) caught up with turions to learn about her most recent role as Artistic Director for Trinity Square Video, the experiences she gained while studying at the Daniels Faculty, and the role of art and artists in “working toward a decolonized, Indigenized future.”

You completed your Bachelors Degree in Philosophy at UBC. What inspired you to depart from this field and pursue a Master of Visual Studies in Curatorial Studies at U of T?
When I was in school at UBC, I was lucky enough to have a Young Canada Works position over the summer at an artist-run centre called Cineworks. When their Programs Manager left, they invited me to apply for that position, so I ended up working there after I graduated as their Programs Manager and Curator. Art was a way for me to practice philosophy. I could put forward a hypothesis about the world, and the exhibition could test whether the hypothesis meant anything to other people.

I moved to Toronto in 2010, worked here for a couple years, and developed a lot of respect for Barbara Fischer (the Director of the Daniels Faculty’s Master of Visual Studies program in Curatorial Studies). The Daniels Faculty later brought in Charles Stankievech as the Director of the Visual Studies Program, who is also someone that I respect. Through conversations with Barbara and Charles, I realized that the MVS program could be a place for me to continue developing my skills and study with people whose work I admire.

How did your understanding of curation change over the course of the program at U of T?
At the end of the Masters program, you are responsible for producing an exhibition and a complementary writing component. For the exhibition, students in the program partner with one of the university galleries. I had previously worked primarily in an artist-run culture, and this was the first time that I had worked in such a robust bureaucracy. One of the skills I gained was how to negotiate working within much larger institutions.

And university galleries play a different role in the arts community than regular galleries, don’t they?
At university galleries, the connections between exhibitions and knowledge production are more explicit, which you can see through the publishing program at the Art Museum. You can also see the connection between exhibitions and the student body. The Art Museum invites MVS students in to develop exhibitions that are ultimately presented parallel to those that the Art Museum develops as an institution. Because university galleries have rather stable funding, I feel they have an obligation to be radical and experimental with the types of exhibitions that they produce. We’re pretty lucky in Canada to have an art world that’s not intrinsically tied to the art market; we can ask different questions and produce different types of shows.

In your article “Decolonization, Reconciliation, and the Extra-Rational Potential of the Arts” written for ArtsEverywhere, you describe art as a method of “working toward a decolonized, Indigenized future other than through state sponsored and articulated processes of reconciliation.” Could you expand on this? In what ways can art contribute to decolonization?
Art allows us to have strange ideas. It’s a place where propositions can be made that can’t be made in politics or science. It’s a place where we can think differently. The Truth and Reconciliation Report (TRC) was published on behalf of the Canadian State. It was not an Indigenous-led process, and it is, we can generally say, a process that has been developed to ease of the mind of settler Canadians rather than address the trauma that is anchored in Indigenous communities. Art is a place where we can imagine a decolonized future not authored by the Canadian State, and it is important to hold the idea of decolonization in our minds going forward.

Why is it important for artists to take on this role?
If you are doing work or producing scholarship in Canada then you should be engaging with the political realities of this place. The production of art and the making of exhibitions is not neutral. It is important to realize how we perpetuate power relations in our work, and if you think there is something troubling about the way power is distributed in civic society then you should be doing something to counteract that.

What inspired your work in this area?
I grew up in northern Alberta on a farm, where there were a number of reserves close by, and my mom is of Ojibwe heritage. I have always thought a lot about what it means to be of mixed settler and Indigenous heritage. I don’t know how to look at culture in this country and not think about the ways that settler colonialism has impacted upon it.

You are the Director of No Reading After the Internet – a reading group for cultural texts. Could you describe the experience of reading an article aloud to a group? What are the outcomes of this activity?
No Reading After the Internet is an event where we read a cultural text aloud together. There are a couple reasons why it’s structured this way. The first is that it removes a barrier of entry. All you have to do is show up, and we encounter the text together. The other thing is that when people use their voice to read a text out loud, they are more apt to participate in the conversation that follows. One measure of success is whether everyone who came to an event spoke about the text. The nice thing about No Reading is that it de-emphasizes scholarship. We’re all encountering this text for the first time together. It’s much more improvisational than a class at school. It’s not about performing how smart you are; it’s about being curious, and being willing to think with other people. The conversations that come out of this process have been incredibly rich.

In July 2016, you were appointed the interim Artistic Director of Trinity Square Video (TSV). How has TSV contributed to the arts community in Toronto? What has been your vision going into this role?
Trinity Square has been around for over 45 years; it’s one of the oldest media arts, artist-run centres in the country. Its areas of activity revolve around production and presentation. For the creation of the work itself, we have production gear and post-production resources that our members can access. For the presentation of the work, we make exhibitions, coordinate screenings, host talks, and make publications. The production and presentation activities at Trinity Square are closely linked; there is reflexivity between the activities so that they inform one another.

John G. Hampton (MVS 2014), who was also a graduate of the MVS program, was at Trinity Square prior to me. I’m still in the process of realizing the exhibitions that he had put together. Going forward, I’ve been thinking about what it would mean to divest from white supremacy. Is there some way as an institution or as a structure that we can interrupt white supremacy through our work? I feel like the answer has to be yes, but I don’t know how exactly to do that yet, so I’m going to try and figure that out.

Do you have any advice for undergraduates pursuing a degree in Visual Studies from U of T?
I know art students are often encouraged to apply to open calls as a way to get their work seen. I would say that a better way to do this is to ask curators to do studio visits with you. As a curator, a studio visit is the basic unit of research. It is the equivalent to laboratory tests if you’re a scientist. So I would say find a curator that you respect, and ask them to come view your work and give you feedback.

What advice would you offer those considering the Master of Visual Studies in Curatorial Studies program?
Be as curious as possible. Go to as many shows as possible. Just writing a few sentences about every show you see to reflect on what you’ve seen and how you’re interpreting it is an incredible way to be critically present.

Photo, top: Image of exhibition The Fraud that Goes Under the Name of Love at the Audain Gallery. Photo by Blaine Campbell.

PULP: paper art party — co-founded by a collective that includes third year Master of Architecture student Rotem Yaniv and Mikael Sydor (MArch 2015) — celebrates it’s 5^th anniversary this year on Saturday, January 14^th. “Devoted to the integration of design, architecture, environmental awareness, and social activity to enhance communities around the city,” the annual event includes live music, art, and a late-night dance party. This year, proceeds raised will be donated to the Yonge Street Mission's Evergreen Centre for Street Youth.

What can we look forward to during this year’s festivities? Rotem Yaniv answered a few of our questions about the evolution the popular paper party and how it has influenced his work as a student.

This will be the fifth year of the PULP paper party. How has the party changed over the years?
We tweak it a bit every year. This year, for example, there are two acts: Art Lounge at 8pm and After Party at 11pm. The idea is to have a relaxed, lit exhibit with live music, food, drink, and dance performances in the earlier part of the evening for art and jazz folk music lovers. We will then dim the lights and let the DJs take over after 11pm, when people looking for a good dance party are likely to show up. Of course, we welcome guests to stay the entire six and a half hours.

Photo: Urban Lights, by Rotem Yaniv at PULP 2016, used materials reclaimed from Daniels Faculty's waste bins after the completion of Super Studio

What are some memorable moments from years past?
Lemon Bucket Orchestra busting through a wall made of colourful cardboard boxes created by ROLLOUT; glowing origami Stalactites that collapsed when you pulled strings by Makeshift Collective; women from Street Haven, a Toronto women’s shelter, working with Luisa Ayala and making an installation that resembles a house, to name a few.

What are you most excited about for this year’s party?
Aleks Bartosik is returning to PULP with a multidisciplinary performance and installation including dance, costume, projections, and live musician; BD Studio is returning with their folded paper lattice technique; Susie Shower is bringing 5 overhead projectors to make an interactive environment; Mark Francis and Natalia Bakaeva are hanging paper and letting guests tear parts off it… not to mention the live music by Vivienne Wilder and our DJs — Ebony and Wasserman.

Photo: Paper Igloo by MArch students Richard Freeman and Projection Mapping by Kearon Roy Taylor, photo by Dylan Johnston

Your annual paper party is also a fundraiser. So in addition to promoting environmental awareness, you are raising money for organizations such as the Yonge Street Mission Evergreen Centre for Street Involved Youth. How did this initiative come about?
For PULP 2016 artist Ksenija Spasic and the Centre’s Art Director Sharon Abel started working with the youth at the centre. They created an intimate pod out of reclaimed fabric and set it in the middle of the party. The PULP team — Robyn Lewis, Ammar Ijaz, Justin Shin, Mikael Sydor, Pamela Cottrell, and myself — discussed which charity to work with and we agreed that since they are already making an installation they would be perfect. We raised around $1600 and Sharon used the money to start Jubilee Designs at the centre — a summer program that paid the youth fair hourly wages for creating art decors.

What other kind of projects does PULP do?
We do outdoor installations and performances at Summer Solstice and BIG on Bloor Festival. We did an art installation commission for World Wildlife Fund. We also do private event management when we get the chance.

PULP 2015

PULP is also a platform to engage in research on techniques to re-purpose materials that would otherwise be discarded or thrown in the Blue Bin. What sort of things have you learned through this work and how have you applied it?
We can get cardboard tubes for free at Alexanian Carpets but they melt in the rain. We could apply them with a water resistant coating but the recycling process uses water to break materials apart. That means that when we finally throw them out, they may end up in the landfill which would be the exact opposite of what we want. So we wrap them instead in waterproof fabric sleeves that can be easily removed. The idea of separation of materials is following the Cradle to Cradle approach — we encourage artists not to use glues and resins on paper based materials because that ruins their recyclability. We were able to get 7 pavilions made mostly of cardboard stand up in 24 hours of continuous rain and keep them dry and recyclable.

Part of PULP’s mission is to build a community network. Who are some of the groups that you have worked with and how have you collaborated?
The Bloordale Improvement Group, BIA, CIA, the offices of Councillors Bailão and Wong-tam, The Junction BIA, GALDSU, and our own growing network of artists — we are in constant communication with them and I attend community meetings. Community groups provide networking and promotion in return to PULP bringing something new for community members. It is interesting to think of communities as clients and of PULP as architects — we design spaces for a limited time for communities to enjoy.

Contoured Environment by RAW Design and Sea Pod by Ksenija Spasic and Evergreen Centre at PULP 2016, photo by Dylan Johnston

How does your work with PULP influence or enhance your work as a Master of Architecture student and vice versa? Is the focus of your research as a student related to the work you do through PULP?
Last semester I worked with studio instructors Terri Peters and Stephen Verderber on a mental health facility for children. The design included a skate-park, splash pad, and climbing wall, with the ability for inpatients and community artists to paint murals on exterior walls. The idea that inhabitants can own their space by engaging with it is something I keep exploring with this organization.

Anything else you’d like to add?
Please donate to our fundraiser campaign! Evergreen wishes to expand the Jubilee Design program. Individuals who donate over $50 and businesses which donate over $250 will be mentioned in a special list on our website, but you can donate as little as $2. Visit http://pulpartparty.ca/
 

Photo, top: Paper Environment by Aleks Bartosik at PULP 2015, photo by Haley Park

2. "A Place that Fits: Landscape Architecture" with Kathryn Gustafson (March 4, 2014)

3. "Fish pluralities, refraction and decolonization in amiskwaciwâskahikan" with Zoe Todd (March 14, 2016)

4. "Walking Your Talk - Integrating Walkability in Urban Design" with Jennifer Keesmaat (November 7, 2013)

5. Green Roof Gurus Panel (March 6, 2014)

6. "Every building implies a city" with Bruce Kuwabara (January 22, 2013)

7. "Sustainable Drainage" with Laura Solano (November 15, 2012)

8. "Working in Mumbai" with Rahul Mehrotra (March 19, 2013)

9. Uber Urbanism (October 22, 2015)

10. 125th Anniversary Dialogues: Practice in an Expanded Field (May 30, 2015)

More videos can be found on the Daniels Faculty Youtube channel.

The Daniels Faculty’s public programming has a tradition of bringing together scholars, professionals, and leaders in the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, art, and urbanism. This year, as we prepare for our Faculty's big move to One Spadina Crescent, we decided to take a different approach to the staging of our events.

For the 2016-2017 season, we will mostly forego the traditional monographic lecture format for one that presents interdisciplinary discussions and debates that promise to deepen the discourse on the role our disciplines play in creating more culturally engaged, ecologically sustainable, socially just, and artfully conceived artifacts, cities, and environments.

To this end, we have organized seven signature events in venues throughout the University of Toronto’s St. George Campus.

The first event will take place today, October 17th. Co-organized with the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA), “What comes after the environment?” — this year’s George Baird Lecture — will feature a discussion between award-winning author and filmmaker Naomi Klein, and the director of the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Mirko Zardini at Convocation Hall (31 King's College Circle).

The events that follow include this year’s Frank Gehry International Visiting Chairs in Architecture Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee in conversation with Michelle Addington from the Yale School of Architecture (“When do looks matter more than performance?”), contemporary media artist Walid Raad on the role of narrative in our understanding of reality (“How can fiction replace reality”), and the 2016-2017 Michael Hough / OALA Visiting Critic Pierre Bélanger in conversation with NYU Environmental Studies scholar Jessica Green, (“What is the geography of energy?”) — among others. Each presentation considers problems that cannot be solved by any one discipline or singular expertise, highlighting the role of architects, artists, and designers in facilitating new modes of research and practice tuned to our changing planet and the evolving needs of society.

For our full schedule of public events, visit daniels.utoronto.ca/events, where you may also find information on our Building, Ecology, Science, and Technology (B.E.S.T.) Lectures, midday talks, Master of Visual Studies Proseminar Series, and other public lectures.

For more information on our public lectures, contact Pam Walls at pamela.walls@daniels.utoronto.ca or 416-978-2253. 2016-2017 Public Lectures
 
MONDAY, OCTOBER 17 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
What comes after the environment?
Convocation Hall, 31 King’s College Circle
George Baird Lecture
Co-organized with the Canadian Centre for Architecture
Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate
Mirko Zardini, director of the CCA and author of the forthcoming book It’s All Happening So Fast — A Counter-History of the Modern Canadian Environment
 
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3 | 7:00PM – 9:00PM
When do looks matter more than performance?
Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Avenue
Gehry Chair Lecture
Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee, Johnston Marklee, Los Angeles
Michelle Addington, Yale University, New Haven
 
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 21 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
What shapes the city?
Isabel Bader Theatre, 93 Charles Street West
Richard Florida, University of Toronto
Adam Greenfield, Urbanscale, London
 
THURSDAY, JANUARY 19 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
What is the geography of energy?
Isabel Bader Theatre, 93 Charles Street West
Michael Hough / Ontario Association of Landscape Architects Visiting Critic Lecture
Pierre Bélanger, Harvard University, Cambridge
Jessica Green, New York University, New York
 
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 9 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
How can fiction replace reality?
Isabel Bader Theatre, 93 Charles Street West
Walid Raad, The Cooper Union, New York
 
TUESDAY, MARCH 14 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
When is a model a beginning or an end?
Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Avenue
Amale Andraos, Columbia University, New York
D. Graham Burnett, Princeton University, Princeton
 
FRIDAY, APRIL 7 | 6:30PM – 8:30PM
Where is the critical voice in architecture today?
Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Avenue
Co-organized with the Canadian Centre for Architecture
Kenneth Frampton, Columbia University, New York
Keller Easterling, Yale University, New Haven
Craig Buckley, Yale University, New Haven

From October 22 to January 22, work by Professor Lisa Steele and Associate Professor Kim Tomczak will be on display in the exhibition The Long Time: 21st Century Art of Steele + Tomczak, curated by Paul Wong.

Central to the exhibit is the "…before I wake trilogy." The result of twelve years of work, it is comprised of three video components: We’re Getting Younger All The Time, Practicing Death, and Entranced.

“This monumental love story searches for the fountain of youth, surrenders to the idea of eternal sleep, and crosses the threshold of the hereafter,” writes Paul Wong. “It is poignant, chilling, and deeply personal.”

Other works in the exhibition include Becoming…, a 3-channel video installation that observes the built environments of Berlin, Vancouver and Toronto; The Miniatures, a series of video objects that offer trenchant phrases drenched in beauty; and the on-going photo/text series…bump in the night, a series of interviews with young people created with the cooperation of the Windsor Youth Centre and the Detroit Hispanic Development Corporation.

The Long Time: 21st Century Art of Steele + Tomczak exhibition launched with an opening reception on October 21, and a panel discussion on October 22 from 12PM to 4PM. The Art Gallery of Windsor is located at 401 Riverside Drive, and is regularly open Wednesday to Sunday, 11AM to 5PM.

Earlier this year, Steele and Tomczak were featured in Canadian Art’s 2016 Art School Smart Guide, which highlighted art schools in Canada that are "thinking outside the box." The Guide profiled the practice of Kim Tomczak and Lisa Steele as a way to introduce the work that goes on within the Daniels Faculty. “When we start a new project, we always submerge ourselves into the research, and as collaborators, we talk and argue a lot," say Tomczak and Steele. "Concentrating on the concepts being investigated — rather than obsessing about the materiality — helps refine the finished work. In our teaching, sometimes we have to teach a technical process, but the quicker we can move to the idea being mobilized, the better it is.”

On October 13, Instructor and MVS Alumnus Joshua Thorpe (MVS 2009) — in collaboration with ERA Architects and Blackwell Engineers — unveiled his recent installation titled Flag Field at Maple Claire Park. The artwork consists of 14 flags on flag poles, ranging from 25 to 50 feet high, clustered into two areas in the park.

“This work moves from turf to sky, is activated by the wind, and plays on the topography of the park,” says Thorpe. “People can linger through paths in the poles, gaze up and space out, and kids can run about and play tag.”

Flag Field is part of an ongoing project to revitalize Maple Claire Park in light of funds becoming available from the adjacent Stockyards retail mall development. The revitalization includes new plantings, a new splash pad, a public art competition, and eventually a sports field.

Earlier this year, Thorpe launched a book titled The Unexpected with Emily Smit-Dicks. Through a combination of flash fiction and poetry, the book tells “a story of love in a hundred pages of slowly unfolding scenes in melancholy and joy.” The Unexpected is available for purchase through The Swimmers Group.