Substitute City (2001)
In 2001 I curated the exhibition Substitute City at the Power Plant (24 March - 27 May 2001). While seemingly an exhibition about how Toronto was represented photographically by artists (photo/film/video/graphic novels), it was really about how artists moved through the city, in particular its unsurveilled areas. In 2016 very little of this city still exists, transformed as it has been through the predatory needs of capital, so collectively the works capture a city that is lost to us. My catalogue text was written and edited, the layout planned, and the designer secured when the Power Plant cancelled the catalogue due to overspending in other areas. In 2006 Prefix Photo committed itself to publish the book. It has yet to appear. What follows is the Power Plant Newsletter text and its reprint published by Contact Toronto Photography Festival in its May 2002 program.
Image: detail from Michael Awad, Chinatown #1, 1995