{"id":2051,"date":"2007-06-27T18:32:14","date_gmt":"2007-06-27T22:32:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=2051"},"modified":"2013-01-21T12:55:06","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T17:55:06","slug":"adding-art-to-our-street-furniture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2007\/06\/27\/adding-art-to-our-street-furniture\/","title":{"rendered":"Adding art to our street furniture"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Ecomedia<\/a>, the new company that bought out EUCAN and took control of Toronto’s silver box waste bins, introduced an interesting program today that is worth discussing with our readers.<\/p>\n

The program is called Street Art\u00e2\u201e\u00a2 Sponsorship Program<\/a>. A few selected bins around the city will display work by local artists. The first artist to be featured is David Arathoon<\/a> (also check out his website<\/a>). Ecomedia states they “…launched a Street Art Program to communicate the importance of ART and RECYCLING in Public Spaces. We believe this is one of the cornerstones of civic responsibility. From this point on, until the end of 2009, we will work with our sponsors to showcase a wide variety of Art, our talented Toronto and GTA-based artists, and beautify our urban landscape. As a result, Toronto will be a cleaner and more beautiful city.”<\/p>\n

On one side of the bin is a biography of the artist and on the other end is the logo of the sponsor. Craig Marwood, Ecomedia’s president, says each artist is consulted as to which company they wish to be teamed up with.<\/p>\n

So here’s my take on this project: On the surface this is a decent start. The public gets to see some art instead of being pressured to buy a product. Why is this significant? When we see something that is not an ad on the street it (sadly) looks out of place and we begin to wonder about it. One of the greatest things about Public Art is how it challenges a person’s regular conceptions (or misconceptions) and sparks some kind of thought-process. An advert for a soft drink or a new condo rarely does this.<\/p>\n

Also, one of the many points I’ve tried to make about the perils of ad creep<\/a> in Toronto is the need for local expression, especially from the arts sector. To some extent, this project addresses my sentiment. This project is also a lot better than the Transit Stories project<\/a> by OneStop (which asked local photographers to submit photos, without being paid<\/em>, for display on the platform screens during Contact photo festival) simply because the artist is being compensated for their work.<\/p>\n

My concern with the project is simple: I believe small projects like the Street Art\u00e2\u201e\u00a2 Sponsorship Program only further legitimize ad-funded street furniture because the supplier (in this case Ecomedia) is “giving back” to the community. Andy Barrie of CBC’s Metro Morning recently told me he’s trying to convince outdoor video ad companies to display well-known pieces of Canadian art for 1 minute every hour (he says there’s been a few businesses willing to listen to him). I’m interested to hear what Sacing Wire readers have to say on this topic since I haven’t really made up my mind on this issue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ecomedia, the new company that bought out EUCAN and took control of Toronto’s silver box waste bins, introduced an interesting program today that is worth discussing with our readers. The program is called Street Art\u00e2\u201e\u00a2 Sponsorship Program. A few selected bins around the city will display work by local artists. The first artist to beContinue reading “Adding art to our street furniture”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1022,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,21759,32],"tags":[11,3426,315,307,4349,6168,4351,6167,475,19],"class_list":["post-2051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-features","category-streetscape","tag-ad-creep","tag-andy-barrie","tag-artist","tag-cbc","tag-craig-marwood","tag-david-arathoon","tag-ecomedia","tag-first-artist","tag-president","tag-toronto"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAdding art to our street furniture - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2007\/06\/27\/adding-art-to-our-street-furniture\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Adding art to our street furniture - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Ecomedia, the new company that bought out EUCAN and took control of Toronto’s silver box waste bins, introduced an interesting program today that is worth discussing with our readers. 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