“First Impressions” Series IV launched on TTC

November 24, 2011 - The latest in the First Impressions poster series has been launched on TTC subways and busses this month.

Developed by Toronto Arts Council in partnership with Heritage Toronto, the campaign was initiated thanks to the generous sponsorship of RBC. Six new posters feature three contemporary Toronto artists: Dáirine Ní Mheadhra, Co-Artistic Director of Queen of Puddings, Andrew Moro, Artistic Director of Red Pepper Spectacle Arts, and Trichy Sankaran, musician, Professor and scholar of Indian music, and three historic figures: poet Walt Whitman, journalist Robert Thomas Allen and writer William Lyon MacKenzie, who was also Toronto’s first mayor.

The First Impressions TTC poster campaign was launched in September 2009 and has run for 60 weeks over the course of two years. The series comprises of 18 posters featuring historic and contemporary artists, and their first impressions of Toronto. First Impressions honours Toronto’s arts community, past and present, telling our city’s stories and celebrating our diverse heritage.

The public context of the Toronto subway, bus and streetcar as “art gallery” allows the First Impressions exhibition to be accessible and available to everyone. Through its exposure on TTC, First Impressions has reached out to a broad cross-section of contemporary Torontonians to help them realize the importance of their own stories to the historical narrative of our city. By mid-December 2012, the First Impressions posters will have had made an impact of well over 170 million impressions across the City of Toronto.

“The series recognizes the significant role immigration plays in the evolution of the arts in Toronto and the development of our country,” said Executive Director Claire Hopkinson. “The juxtaposition of contemporary artists with figures from Canadian History really tells the story about the creation of legacy in Canada and the groundbreaking work that the artist does in the building of a nation’s identity.”

Previously featured posters include the following: (March 2011 series) actor Arsinée Khanjian, dancer Keiko Kitano, film-maker Harry Rasky and 19th century writer, Anna Jameson; (May 2010 series): contemporary video artist and cultural critic Richard Fung, and composer and interdisciplinary artist Juliet Palmer, anarchist, activist and writer Emma Goldman, and 19th Century landscape artist Lucius O’Brien; (September 2009 series) portray dancer and choreographer Lata Pada, theatre artist and artistic director Soheil Parsa, 20th century author Pierre Berton, and 19th century artist and diarist Elizabeth Simcoe.

First Impressions has been an inspiring example of city-wide collaboration and multi-level partnership between RBC with municipal organizations – Toronto Arts Council, Toronto Arts Foundation, and Heritage Toronto; local businesses – CBS Outdoors and the George Partnership; local professional photographers Giulio Muratori andDenise Grant; provincial and federal organizations – Archives of Ontario Archives and Library and Archives Canada and, not the least, our local featured artists who offered their stories.