Toronto Tributes + Tributaries: 1971-1989

Exploring the experimental energy of an era, Toronto: Tributes + Tributaries, 1971-1989 brings together more than 100 works by 65 artists and collectives to highlight an innovative period in Toronto art history. Amidst the social and political upheavals of their time, the generation of artists that emerged in Toronto during the 1970s and 1980s pushed the boundaries of conventional painting, sculpture and photography, exploring new ways of art making including video, installation and performance. Drawing heavily from the AGO collection, Toronto: Tributes + Tributaries, 1971-1989 fills the entire fourth floor of the AGO’s Contemporary Tower. This is the companion publication for the AGO exhibition of 2017.

Organized thematically and punctuated by references to Toronto and its cityscape, the exhibition highlighted the era’s preoccupation with ideas of performance, the body, the image, self portraiture, storytelling, and representation. Featured artists include Michael Snow, Joanne Tod, the Clichettes, Duke Redbird, Barbara Astman, Robin Collyer, Robert Houle, Carol Conde and Carl Beveridge, as well as highly influential artists like photographer June Clarke, illustrator Ato Seitu, and dub poet Lillian Allen.

Edited by Wanda Nanibush, assistant curator of Canadian and Indigenous art, the title of the catalogue, a reference to the city’s many buried waterways, serves as a visual metaphor for the diversity of the cities art scene and its similarly buried histories.