Stage Door News
Toronto: Arts and culture on the Bloor Street Culture Corridor in January 2023
Monday, January 2, 2023
Happy New Year! We are delighted to ring in 2023 with you all, as we celebrate a fresh start with lots of offerings on display from our partners. Make it your resolution to experience more arts and culture in your life and plan your visit to the Bloor St. Culture Corridor!
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Enter Now – The ROM Wildlife Photo Contest returns for the eighth year! Whether you’re an amateur or professional photographer, ROM invites you to share your captivating images of the natural world for a chance to win some amazing prizes and have your photograph on display at the Museum. Whether on a sunny vacation or adventures in your own backyard, get out into nature and share your wildlife images from your unlocked Twitter or Instagram.
Women's Art Association of Canada
The Dignam Gallery presents Black and White, WAAC's all-members exhibition, January 12-February 11. The Ruth Upjohn Gallery presents WAAC artist members' solo exhibition - Jane Bowen January 1-21; Ariana Gaila January 25-February 4. WAAC ARTS releases the Artist's Voice Winter 2023 speaker series lineup: April Hickox, Janice Mason Steeves, and Penelope Stewart. On January 19 at 1pm, Artist’s Voice presents April Hickox, Landscape Time and Place, a ZOOM session. April will speak about her upcoming book, Meeting Myself Anew: On Becoming an Artist Later in Life and describe her innovative Workshops in Wild Places.
Alliance Française Toronto is starting 2023 with remarkable events! On January 21, they host Ravel Inspirations Concert by Ensemble Cordâme. Composer and double bass player, Jean Félix Mailloux, has composed pieces inspired by Ravel's impressionist universe and adapted several of his most famous pieces. They also welcome the exhibition of Lan Florence Yee January 16-February 4. The artist collects text in underappreciated places and ferments it until it is too suspicious to ignore. Plus, three movies and a lecture in January's program.
The Royal Conservatory's 21C Music Festival continues in January with a focus on new music composed and performed by innovative artists. Post-classical pianist Jean-Michel Blais makes his Koerner Hall debut on January 20. Iconic jazz pianist Fred Hersch and his trio are joined by the Dior Quartet, and trumpeter Andrew McAnsh performs a five-part suite on January 21. Métis composer Ian Cusson's works will be played by Trio Arkel, Duo Concertante, and Charles Hamann, alongside the world premiere of an RCM commission by Stewart Goodyear with Michael and Roberto Occhipinti, Joy Lapps, and Larnell Lewis. Cellist Alisa Weilerstein weaves together Bach’s solo cello suites with newly commissioned works on January 28. The world premiere of Unruly Sun, a theatrical song cycle inspired by Derek Jarman's memoir, takes place on January 29. Additional performances include the debut of pianist Leif Ove Andsnes on January 26, along with more 21C concerts.
Starting January, The Japan Foundation, Toronto will unveil part 2 of its Hiroshige’s “Edo Hyaku” exhibition of ukiyo-e prints, with originals from the ROM. Starting January 5, visitors to JFT’s Library can receive a fukubukuro, or lucky bag, containing secret selections of print and/or AV material. Enjoy serendipitous discovery from a curated selection of Japan-related books! On January 21 and January 22, JFT is bringing you a weekend of contemporary Japanese Films at Hot Docs Cinema. All screenings are free, but registration is required. Online programming continues with a talk by Dr. Paula Curtis on the state of Digital Humanities in Japan Studies on January 19. As well, the Winter Semester of Online Japanese classes will begin in January, and Canadians all over the country can study Japanese from home.
The Estonian Ministry of Culture has named 2023 as the year of movement to promote healthy living and active lifestyles. On January 5 at 7pm, VEMU and Estonian Music Week will be kicking off their programming and the year of movement with a concert and folk dance workshop by Estonian-Canadian traditional music ensemble "Hypnosis Negative", along with the folk dance group "Kungla". Tickets are $20 ($10 for students). Following this, on January 22 at 3pm will be a film screening of "Vallatud kurvid / Mischievous Curves" (1959) an Estonian sport comedy. The exhibition "Our Tartu - 50 Years of Tartu College" will also be on view for the month of January.
A new online exhibition is now live for Mischief & Mirth: The Wonderful World of Fairies, based on the library's in-person exhibit at Toronto Reference Library. Explore over 50 rare books, prints, imaginary maps and more from the library's Special Collections — as well as fairy-related photos and costume sketches from the National Ballet of Canada. Learn about the origin of the tooth fairy, how two cousins convinced the world that fairies were real and much more. No end date. Free
Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre
Miles Nadal JCC offers you wellness and community connection this January! Sing your heart out in their Daytime Choir with director Asher Farber starting January 10. Their Suzuki string instrument instruction for youth aged 2+ also starts January 10, while adults can learn Ukulele or join their Klezmer ensemble programs starting January 24. Keeping Connected: The collected works of the Bernard Betel Centre’s visual arts classes is in their gallery from January 5-31. "Influential Jewish Playwrights: What Comes First, Being a Playwright or a Jew?" is a three-part series with theatre critic Lynn Slotkin that starts on January 16. They also offer day and evening Beginner Hebrew classes for adults starting January 19 and a Beginner Conversational Yiddish course that launches January 17. Language classes are live on Zoom and are open to all!
University of Toronto Faculty of Music
The University of Toronto Faculty of Music kicks off 2023 with dynamic ensemble Seraph Brass, 2022-23 Wilma and Clifford Smith Visitor in Music. January 11-14 Seraph Brass will hold a series of open rehearsals and master classes culminating in a recital January 13. January 23, Joseph Johnson, professor and principal cellist with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, presents Side-by-Side: Winter Bach, the second in the new series featuring renown faculty alongside their students. And mark your calendars for January 28 for the first in-person University of Toronto New Music Festival since 2020! Featuring composer Ana Sokolović, 2022-23 Roger D. Moore Distinguished Visitor in Composition, this weeklong festival includes performances by several of the Faculty’s ensembles, the Karen Kieser Prize concert, Hatzis @ 70, a celebration of composer and professor Christos Hatzis during his 70th birthday year, and much more.
Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema kicks-off the new year with a dynamic lineup of doc premieres, popular film series, family screenings, and special events. Discover the riveting story behind the revolutionary American chef who paved the way for today’s celebrity chefs in Love, Charlie: The Rise and Fall of Chef Charlie Trotter. Immerse yourself in Ever Deadly, a cinematic exploration of avant-garde Inuk throat singer Tanya Tagaq’s transformation of sound. Journey to Maikot, a remote village in the Himalayas where the locals are preparing for the harvest of a mysterious aphrodisiac caterpillar fungus worth more than gold, in Far Beyond the Pasturelands. A one-night-only screening of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck reveals a counterintuitive approach to living a good life. Family Screenings return, screening The Lego Movie. Just announced: new Spring Curious Minds Courses to launch in January and February, exploring a diversity of topics: the women behind modern art's most iconic masterpieces, the Bauhaus movement, philosophy, and garden cities.
Discover 4,500 years worth of footwear history at the Bata Shoe Museum! Explore society’s obsession with shoes in their latest exhibit Obsessed: How Shoes Became Objects of Desire, see the most futuristic shoe designs, and check out their incredible 18th century footwear collection. Kids (and adults) can enjoy trying on their funky footwear, play a scavenger hunt, read a story in their Cobbler’s Corner and so much more. Don’t forget, they offer FREE admission every Sunday! Can’t visit the museum? Get a glimpse of their collection by watching their Off the Shelf series or check out their online exhibitions from the comfort of your own home.
Kick off the New Year at the Gardiner Museum! See the acclaimed special exhibition Karine Giboulo: Housewarming, an immersive universe populated by more than 500 miniature clay figures that tell stories about some of our most urgent social issues, from the pandemic to the climate crisis. Delve deeper into the exhibition with talks, tours, workshops, and special events that bring its themes to life. Winter is also the perfect time to register for a clay class! Sign up now and express your creativity in the studio this season.
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The Bloor St. Culture Corridor, Toronto's most diverse arts and culture district, is a true creative cluster, an arts and culture destination, and a collaboration between some of Toronto's most dynamic arts and culture organizations.
The Bloor St. Culture Corridor offers the public a wide variety of arts genres, from museum experiences to films, art exhibitions to music concerts, and opportunities to experience some of Toronto's cultural diversity, including Aboriginal, French, Jewish, Italian, Japanese, Estonian, African and Caribbean arts and culture.
All Bloor St. Culture Corridor organizations present arts and cultural events for the public year-round in destination venues located in a cluster along a vibrant stretch of Bloor Street West. Each year more than three million members of the public go to Bloor St. Culture Corridor arts and culture destinations, and attend exhibitions, performances, and events. Together, the Bloor St. Culture Corridor organizations employ more than 5,500 culture workers and generate more than $629,500,000 in economic impact each year. In 2016, The Bloor St. Culture Corridor was successful in working with the City of Toronto to have the Bloor St. Culture corridor section of Bloor St. West designated an official City of Toronto cultural corridor.