Creative City is a single-issue magazine being created by four Centennial College journalism students: Laura Godfrey, Rahul Gupta, Omar Mosleh and Ciarán Thompson. This is our story.
Marlee Cargill
One sunny September afternoon, Creative City editors Omar Mosleh and Laura Godfrey travelled to the artsy Queen West neighbourhood to document some of the area’s performing artists in action. They found Marlee Cargill.
A choreographer and dancer who has demonstrated her talents for film, television and the stage, Cargill, who will grace the cover of our inaugural issue, unleashed a kinetic display of street theatre involving a dented filing cabinet and jungle music. Her performance thrilled all in attendance, including the two awestruck editors.
Later on, Cargill related her love of performance, which she said had been renewed thanks to her neighbourhood. Seeking to recharge her creative batteries after a two-year stay in Europe, one morning Cargill piled her filing cabinet and portable stereo onto a dolly and trudged three blocks to the intersection of Queen and Soho streets to dance for commuters, tourists and curious onlookers slowly gathering around her. She was an instant hit.
“One guy told me it was the best piece of art he had seen all day,” Cargill said. “And he had just come back from the AGO.”
But while artists like Cargill use the streets of Toronto as the setting, canvas and sometimes the muse for their work, they remain largely anonymous. Without the city, they wouldn’ t be able to make a living through their creative expression, yet they are swallowed up by the vast diversity Toronto offers. It’s hard being an artist in the Big Smoke.
Public art in the Queen Street West area.
Fortunately, neighbourhoods are increasingly being transformed through art and creativity. In some cases, the change is social. The Cabbagetown Youth Centre, for example, organized a summer camp for the disadvantaged youth in the area to give them a comforting place to escape to if only for a few hours a day. “In a lot of ways, the CYC is a sanctuary,” said Christina de la Cruz, a dance instructor at the centre.
In the St. Clair West neighbourhood, local agencies are founding radical creative experiments such as Wychwood Barns, which renovated the crumbling TTC street car barns into an artist space and residence for full-time artists. The area, home to some of the best ethnic eateries and garment shops in town, now counts artists as its residents.
Our magazine hopes to show how art has transformed Toronto’s neighbourhoods and street corners. Without it, our city would be nothing more than a collection of concrete and glass. Art gives the city life and vibrancy. It transforms its environment and fosters creative expression.
We at Creative City strive to put the spotlight on neglected artists and artist movements creating original works of art in the art galleries, live music clubs and public spaces of Toronto. We’ll comb through the depths of the city’s cultural history to uncover cultural gems hidden in the multicultural neighbourhoods of the downtown core and beyond.
Laura Godfrey
Rahul Gupta
Ciaran Thompson
