Arts & Culture

It's hard to believe the CONTACT Photography Festival -- which runs throughout the month of May--is almost half over. There are still dozens of exhibitions and events taking place throughout the city; Our own exhibition at Toronto Reference Library, Exposed features highlights from the Toronto Star archive. On May 28 at 2pm, we're lucky to have Stephen Bulger -- his Queen West gallery is one of the preeminent photography venues in the city -- conduct a tour of the exhibit.

In keeping with all this activity, the Arts Department on the fifth floor of Toronto Reference has just received a bumper collection of new photography books. They are full of surprises. Matador features wonderful work by Spanish photographer Ricky Davila whose pictures of his extended family replicates Nicholas Nixon's classic photographs of the Brown sisters.

With their casual poses and exquisite attention to light, both share links with some of the brilliant portraits by recently rediscovered Arkansas photographer Mike Disfarmer. Toronto Reference is fortunate to have new books featuring all three photographers:

            

These are just a few of the new additions to our collection. They all look great, but they are so visually different that collectively they make a strong argument that photography might just be as diverse as painting.