Open Eyes Toronto (OYT) is a creative collective that generates dialogue, design and response to current issues and daily life in Toronto. OYT began in 2008 when two local architects were feeling a bit uninspired by the city – so they invited friends and friends of friends to a living room in the Annex to share creative documentation about what’s happening in the city. In recent years OYT has grown to attract several hundreds and has been hosted at the Centre for Social Innovation and the Gladstone Hotel in Toronto. Interesting work and displays serve as a the backdrop for conversation and community.
We are looking for artists, urbanists and creatives to explore what is inspiring, thought provoking or problematic related to condo living in Toronto.
What is your condo life? What will the skyline look like in 20 years? Are we happy adapting to smaller spaces in the sky? How does living in a vertical city, surrounded by a sea of urbanity, change our relationship to our physical and cultural landscape?
Be as literal, abstract, specific or open ended as you’d like; have your process be conceptual, experiential or critical. Choose your scale, media, focus, and angle… photography, sculpture, video, interpretive dance, etc.
Submit a brief description of your idea to works@openeyestoronto.com by November 1, 2013 describing the size, media and concept.
All accepted submissions will be notified shortly after and will be exhibited at the Condo Show on November 21st, and online.
The call for submissions can be found here: http://www.openeyestoronto.com/
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For inspiration we’ve compiled some snippets from recent reports about urbanization at three scales:
Local: Toronto
“The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) has undergone a structural shift in its housing mix whereby record-new condo sales have picked up slack left by fewer single-family homes being built…To accommodate the 38,000 or so net new households it sees every year, the GTA must increasingly expand its housing stock ‘vertically’”
RBC Economics Research, Current Analysis- July 2012.
Medial: Greater Golden Horseshoe
“In 2006, the population of the Greater Golden Horseshoe was 8.4 million. By 2031, the total population is forecasted to reach 11.5 million people, and 5.5 million jobs will be located here… As the largest urban region in Canada, the Greater Golden Horseshoe generates two-thirds of the province’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).”
Growth Plan for the Greater GoldenHorseshoe
Global: World
“Between 2011 and 2050, the world population is expected to increase by 2.3 billion, passing from 7.0 billion to 9.3 billion (United Nations, 2011). At the same time, the population living in urban areas is projected to gain 2.6 billion, passing from 3.6 billion in 2011 to 6.3 billion 2050. Thus, the urban areas of the world are expected to absorb all the population growth expected over the next four decades while at the same time drawing in some of the rural population… Furthermore, most of the population growth expected in urban areas will be concentrated in the cities and towns of the less developed regions. Asia, in particular, is projected to see its urban population increase by 1.4 billion, Africa by 0.9 billion, and Latin America and the Caribbean by 0.2 billion. Population growth is therefore becoming largely an urban phenomenon concentrated in the developing world… 78 per cent of the inhabitants of the more developed regions lived in urban areas in 2011, whereas just 47 per cent of those in the less developed regions did so. Urbanization is expected to continue rising in both the more developed and the less developed regions so that, by 2050, urban dwellers will likely account for 86 per cent of the population in the more developed regions and for 64 per cent of that in the less developed regions.Overall, the world population is expected to be 67 per cent urban in 2050.”
World Urbanization Prospects: The 2011 Revision.
If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact us at the address above or at team@openeyestoronto.com.
