26 November 2015 to 16 January 2016
Opening Thursday 26 November from 7 to 9 pm

Peter MacCallum
Skyline Series 1979-1992

The gallery is pleased to present Peter MacCallum’s Skyline Series, 1979-1992, a selection of photographs that pictures the skyline of Toronto’s downtown core, serially documented at two distinct intervals separated by the span of a decade, over twenty years ago. MacCallum set out to document the city as an object, interested in how its overall architectural contour is continually sculpted by light. The changing features of this collective view were made further explicit with the passage of time between documentation, during which a new building, Scotia Plaza, became part of the cluster forming the central financial district. It was only a coincidence, arising from MacCallum’s chance changes in residence, that the second set of photographs was pursued:

“I took the three earliest photos in 1979 and 1980, from the roof of my third floor apartment at 457 Queen Street West, just west of Spadina Avenue. Shortly after I took this first group of skyline views, 457 Queen West was sold and I was forced to move. For several years, I lived in an apartment with no view at all, but in 1986 I began my ongoing tenancy in a new residential building on Vanauley Street. I was now only a short distance away from my former address, and had a similar view of the downtown skyline. My sixth floor balcony gave me a considerably higher viewpoint than the roof of 457 Queen West had offered, so that in the new series of skyline views I began in 1990, my immediate neighbourhood became a prominent element.”

Peter MacCallum lives and works in Toronto. He has exhibited work in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including: Concrete Industries, Museum London, London, Ontario; Larus Delawarensis, Oakville Galleries, Oakville, Ontario; Cement/Concrete, Eric Arthur Gallery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario; and Substitute City, The Power Plant, Toronto, Ontario. His work can be found in the permanent collections of the Art Gallery of Ontario; National Gallery of Canada (CMCP); Oakville Galleries; The Donovan Collection at St. Michael’s College; City of Toronto Archives; and the Archives of Ontario.