Rodrigo Huerta Aguirre –
What does creativity look like later in life? The Bayside Gallery at 30 Merchants’ Wharf (near Sherbourne Common) is inviting locals to “Aging Sparks Creativity,” a free exhibition from March 1 to 30 celebrating art made by elders in the East Bayfront.
From acrylic painting to photography, the show will highlight work “done behind the scenes most of your life,” Alison Conway, a theatre and design professional who is the exhibit’s organizer, told the bridge. “That kind of creativity plays a vital role in maintaining our wellbeing as we age. It sparks feelings of joy; it forges connections with friends. We’re never too old to be creative.”
This will be the second time the Bayside Gallery hosts an elder-oriented exhibition since it opened in 2021. The first, in June 2024, marked the proclamation of Seniors Month in Ontario, featuring pieces by members of Les Centres d’Accueil Héritage and local artists.
Hosting a smaller exhibit this year, Conway wanted a tighter connection with the artists by promoting the event just around the waterfront. “It’s a different kind of flavour this time,” she said.
The idea of an art show exclusive to elders’ art came to Conway while strolling around Parliament Square Park two springs ago. There she saw a group of older women laying hand-knitted hats and gloves on a bench, inspiring her to reflect about creativity in later life. “You made [art] with your own hands, you used spare fabric, it’s useful, it’s beautiful, it keeps you from going mad,” Conway said.
“Elder artists continue to make art, perhaps even more than they did when they were younger,” said Ann Fischer, a retired ESL and English teacher featured in the exhibition. “You are really the same person you’ve always been.”
With published writing and photography in Toronto and Simcoe County, Fischer has contributed a pair of photographs titled “In These Times”, taken as the pandemic slowed down. In them she plays with camera movement to transmit the beginning of summer and the state of the world at that time.
“There’s all the blur and then the struggle to situate ourselves within it,” Fischer said. “You can read all sorts of things into images. It depends on what you bring to the experience.”
Fischer has also hosted solo exhibitions at the Bayside Gallery, and like many artists featured in it, she lives in the condo building above 30 Merchants’ Wharf, also known as Artscape Bayside Lofts. Artscape, the operator of the Bayside Gallery and other cultural spaces, provides affordable housing for artists and their families in eight buildings around the city in partnership with public and private investors.
Bayside Gallery’s five-person volunteer committee takes applications yearly for exhibits. While they prioritize locals and people in the building, outsiders are also encouraged to submit projects for individual or group shows.
“It’s not as if we look and make a decision on the quality of the art. It’s completely random. You can put [art] up, whoever you are,” Conway said. “That thing you made on your sofa while watching Hockey Night in Canada…It’s now in the gallery!”
