10 x 10 x 5 (+1) = XXX OOO
Toronto Public Library is excited to announce that five years of the book 10 x 10: 100 Portraits Celebrating Queers in the Arts are now available at Toronto Reference Library and Yorkville branches. The annual exhibit, held during Pride Month, showcases the work of ten queer photographers who each in turn photograph ten artists from the LGBTQ community.
The photographers include Sue Lloyd, InkedKenny, David Pike, Evergon and April Hickox. Their subjects are a who's who of writers, filmmakers, artists, musicians, playwrights, actors, designers and arts organizers including S Bear Bergman, Jane Farrow, Rae Spoon, Patricia Rozema, John Greyson, Stephen Andrews, Ronnie Burkett, Robert LePage, Charles Pachter, Alec Butler, Andy Fabo, Will Munro, Scott Thompson, Faith Nolan, Rick Mercer, Kathleen Pirrie Adams, Sharon Switzer and Shawn Syms. (And yes, these links will take you to materials in Toronto Public Library collections.)
But since its inception by James Fowler in 2011, the emphasis has been on diversity, what one writer described as "a mixed bag of the well-known and the up-and-coming, and the artists on the walls work in wildly divergent fields." The show has gone on to become a highlight of the Gladstone Hotel's summer programming, and the catalogues function both as a time capsule of the arts in Toronto (and across Canada), as well as an inventory of portrait styles and techniques.
Take, for example, filmmaker Michele Pearson Clarke's aquatic portraits of artist Joshua Vettivelu and sound artist Radiodress.
Samantha Blanchette shows that 3D modeler Sy Blake and character designer Gyimah Gariba have no problem striking a pose. (They're collaborating on a really stunning book.)
Jade Rule's portraits of veteran video artist Richard Fung and filmmaker/television producer Rowan Neilson are appropriately enough, stills from a video piece.
Lastly, check out Zahra Siddiqui's depiction of the dancer Essence and her own graphic self-portrait where Rodchenko meets hip-hop.
The 2016 edition is on order but will be in libraries soon. In the meantime (if I've got my math right) at least 550 creative folk await.
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