The Two Most Famous Paintings In Canadian Art...

I wondered what was going on when I was in the A.G.O. last week and noticed that Tom Thomson's "West Wind" was missing. Arguably the two most famous paintings in Canadian art are hanging side by side in a gallery in London, England this week: Thomson's "West Wind" and "Jack Pine".

Both images are considered icons of the Canadian spirit and it must be wonderful to see them together. They are part of a larger exhibit of Thomson and the Group of Seven that is touring Europe for the first time since the first quarter of last century. The Globe covers the details in this article.

Toronto's Urban Repair Squad's Lego bike lane

The Urban Repair Squad reinstalled a bike lane on Dupont this week that was recently removed by the city, and they used lego. Check out this blog: urbanrepairs.blogspot.com, for the full story and a video about the project.

The Weston Family Learning Centre

The A.G.O. has opened the Weston Family Learning Centre this month with a newly designed educational space including studios and seminar rooms. I'm looking forward to checking it out with some students soon. The Centre features huge windows onto the street and open, interconnected areas throughout. Here is a brief video tour of the Centre on their site.

Two Stories of Algonquin Park

    I came across two inspiring articles this morning. Although both are about completely different people separated by almost a century, they share one common centre point: Algonquin Park.

    The first article is about a new film about the life (and not the death) of Canadian painter Tom Thomson that is opening this weekend at the Vancouver film festival.

    The second article, that features a beautiful short video, is about a Canadian Olympic Kayaker who trains in Algonquin Park, on the lakes that Tom Thomson painted. These articles make me want to get back up to the park to catch the autumn, and do some painting and kayaking.