Big On Bloor Festival
From the last weekend in July – which was very hot BTW !! I checked out the Big On Bloor Festival. According to their website:
“Organized by BIG (Bloor Improvement Group), the Festival is a summer event presented along a car-free stretch of Bloor Street West between Dufferin and Lansdowne to celebrate local arts, culture, and community. It has drawn up to 100,000 people.”
They have different artists painting every year. Here are the three from this year !
Jacquie Comrie Mural
Jacquie was one of the artists who was painting that weekend. I didn’t get to see her as she had finished by the time I got there. Her work focuses on using color to help with mental health issues.
She explains it better on her website:
“Jacquie Comrie is a multidisciplinary Toronto-based artist and mental health advocate. Whether as murals on buildings, large scale structures or canvases, her vibrant body of work is a dynamic exploration of colour as a universal language of human emotion. With mental health issues on the rise across the globe, colour is her medium of social impact helping to create inclusive, colourful spaces of mental reset to ultimately help improve the lives of all individuals, one wall at a time.
I did get to see her when she was working on her butterfly for another project a month earlier. So I will include those photos in my post as well. I hope it’s not too confusing !
Andre Kan Car Artwork
Andre Kan was there at the festival as well. Here he was painting a car for the event.
Here is what he says about himself on his personal website:
“Enlivened by his interest in spacial structures and interconnectivity, Andre Kan’s paintings serve as excitable blueprints for a possible reality. Each work depicts the artists’ signature imaginative building blocks that converge and begin to build upon each other and strengthening each other towards an ever transforming space. Kan’s structures are substantial and complex but not yet anchored – they float suspended in his psychological space. In this way Kan’s buildings remain a playful proposition for the viewer not yet tied to a specific place or function. With his dynamic formations, Kan propels us towards an ever optimistic future where new connections and constructions have yet to materialize.”
I did see him with Jackie a month before also working on a butterfly for Nick Sweetman’s Laneway Project. I will post them soon.. but there are a lot of them to be honest ! And there’s one that I still need a photo of !
Toronto Graffiti Street Art Found Here:
Kizmet♜Gabriel Truck Artwork
Kizmet32 was also there. I have seen him painting a couple of times but I have yet to talk to him. He has been active in the street art scene for many years now.
He has a picture of the finished truck on his Instagram.
