QSW The Rebel Zone 1975-1989: A Cultural Artifact Exhibit
Opening Reception March 18 - 7:00 – 11:00 pm
Exhibition Dates March 15 – Thursday, March 31, 2016
YTB Gallery - 563 Dundas St East, Suite 201
Gallery Hours Tues-Sat 12-6pm - Admission is Free

QSW The Rebel Zone 1975 -1989
Musician and Regent Park artist-in-residence Lorraine Segato has created a point of view exhibition, QUEEN ST. WEST 1975-1989 THE REBEL ZONE, that tells the story of how art and activism ignited a cultural renaissance along Queen Street West and transformed the city of Toronto.The Rebels & Rascals music event will take place on Tuesday, March 29 at Daniels Spectrum at 8pm.
QSW 1975-1989 The Rebel Zone traces key events that inspired the cross-pollination of art, music, and politics, and how these events influenced and nurtured the once derelict area and led to the rebirth of a new cultural scene.
The exhibit features cultural artifacts that represent the events, activities, and people who spearheaded this renaissance including the art group General Idea, the Hummer Sisters, Patti Habib of the BamBoo Club, and Lillian Allen; it revisits seminal events such as the Body Politic and bathhouse raids, the censorship crackdown, the rise of feminism, and the first wave of a new disease called AIDS. QSW The Rebel Zone 1975-1989 recounts a time when art and activism met, merged, and exploded into an expression of radical creativity that changed Toronto forever.
Queen St. West (QSW) 1975-1989 The Rebel Zone is a part of the first annual Myseum Intersections Festival, a collection of exhibits that explore different perspectives on the city’s natural, cultural, and historical diversity.
 

The Complete Unknown.
Artwork by:
Bonerkill
Britta B.
Topher Kong
Sofy Mesa
William Andrew Finlay Stewart

With a critical essay by: Ekow Stone

Curated by Marjan Verstappen

Situated in Regent Park - a renewed neighbourhood, busily adapting much of its identity, Topher Kong, William Andrew Finlay Stewart, Britta B., Ekow Stone, Sofy Mesa, and the Bonerkill collective explore the experience of living amongst all this renewal. They have grown up in, currently live, or work in Regent Park, and have witnessed its recent facelift. Although they approach this site through a multiplicity of material approaches and critical lenses, the strongest connections are the questions posed: “how do we live here?” "how do we be become artists here?"

The Complete Unknown was curated in response to The Rebel Zone, a collection of posters, film, photographs and audio documenting how a previous generation answered the question of how to be an artist. It involved moving to a crumbing, neglected area of downtown Toronto, starting a series of businesses supporting the artistic community, eating in dirt-cheap restaurants, and watching as property values rose, and the downtown as colonized by the middle class.

The questions are not new, though time, geography and economics change how they will be answered. This exhibition celebrates the heritage of Toronto’s artist-run culture, and seeks strategies for it to blossom in the new street plan of Regent Park.

YTB Gallery is generously supported by The Daniels Corporation and Toronto Community Housing. YTB would also like to thank The Toronto Arts Council for funding which made The Complete Unknown possible