TO Design Offsite: Day 4

Here’s what to see and do today at the Toronto Design Offsite Festival:

Tableau Vivant
Date: January 23, 7-9 pm
Location: Toronto School of Art, 2nd Floor
Admission: Free

TSA’s new building hosts a multimedia film noir-inspired installation, including digital window projections and gestural figure studies accumulated along the main stairwell leading up to the TSA studios. ‘Tableau Vivant | Illustration Noir’ transforms a traditional life drawing session into a theatrical film noir stage featuring live music and models prepped with costumes and props. One-night-only.

UPPER 751
Opening Reception: January 23, 7-10 pm
Date: January 23-26
Location: UPPER 751, side entrance
Admission: Free

UPPER 751 is an experiment in multi-purpose, urban living. The space fluctuates between residence, studio and gallery, overlooking a bustling stretch of Queen Street West. A crew of skilled artists, designers and craftspeople were given free reign to exercise their creativity and present work that best showcases their talents, including printmaking, illustration, furniture design, upholstery, sculpture and lighting. Participants include local graffiti artist Dudeman, Doug Brown, Peter Bogaczewicz and more.

Just a Reflection
Opening Reception: Thursday, January 23, 7-10pm
Date: January 20-26
Location: HUNTCLUB
Admission: Free

Between the public outer and private inner spaces, there exists a boundary. ‘Just a Reflection’ occupies the in-between. Playing with existing window facades, a panoply of convex and concave mirrors, and responsive lighting, the threshold becomes its own space of reflection, layering itself upon the outer and inner spaces beyond. leuwebb.ca

Handwork 
Reception: January 23, 6-9 pm
Date: January 20-26
Location: The Angolan Community Centre of Ontario
Admission: Free

In this exhibition, designers Munira Amin and Rachel MacHenry present textile-based prototypes that re-contextualize traditional handwork techniques. This textile collection is based around the idea of growth and decay, with images drawn from plant biology and lace structures. The pieces are designed for production with artisans in South Asia and inspired by the local crafts and cultures in their native countries. Block printing, Ajrak printing and embroidery are often found in Amin’s work, in which she collaborates with a hand block-printing workshop in Karachi and a woman’s collective in Multan, Pakistan, to develop collections of soft furnishings. MacHenry is inspired by historical collections, the natural world and material culture traditions. She collaborates with artisan communities, working to sustain traditional skills and researching regional materials such as plant dyes and local fibres. textilestudio.ca