Dear Fellow Volunteers,

Wishing you all a Happy Holiday season, a peaceful time with family and friends, and dear loved ones. With thanks for all you do, the gallery and visitors are so fortunate to have you on the front line as Information Guides, Gallery Guides, Prints and Drawing volunteers, and others. You are the backbone, first encounter with the visitor, that is so integral to the gallery space and the visitor experience and interaction. 

All Volunteers are intellectual, know so much about the works, collection and the artists. The visitors come away with a rich experience as a result of the exchange between Information, Gallery Guides and Prints and Drawing volunteers.

End of year summary and thanks acknowledgements,

It’s hard to believe it’s been a year taking on the role of Volunteer President and getting to know many of you over the year, has been one of the highlights. All Information and Gallery Guides with fellow Prints and Drawings volunteers on planned excursions. Over the year, we’ve attended four excursions I’ve created and organized, with attendance of close to 120 volunteers from all placements. We met with curators, artists, the incredible Charles Pachter, David Liss (Koffler Gallery) and fellow guides and docents with rich discussions who imparted our shared knowledge and passions over art. Thanks to all the volunteers for coming together and the strength in community.

The connections with our cultural partners and there staff for planning these excursions together with myself from the Koffler Gallery, Gardiner Museum, MCU The Image Centre, fellow gallery guide Aisling Joe for her impactful tour of the Queens Park Collection where she also has a professional role and additionally hosted us with a wine and cheese! Showing us the vast collection and ties with Queens park collection and library has with the AGO, was also a rich memory.

Look forward to future excursion events and meeting more artists, plans which are underway to come in the new year and also tying in with our AGO anniversary. Importantly speaking on the horizon, looking forward to hearing your thoughts, ideas, as a team on the 80th year of AGO Volunteers anniversary, coming to fruition this summer with further details to come.

As Volunteer President, one of my mandates established is being present, listening and providing a bridge with staff. I have set “making every moment count” as a mantra for the volunteer,s and building connecting memories across all placements at the core is essential. Building a strengthened community, creating new ideas and platforms for the volunteers to be recognized, have an opportunity to build on that community and connect and support all volunteers, including hands on artistic opportunities. Connecting with staff and curators on enrichment opportunities as we’ve had recently on the tours and talks.

Volunteer Artists Collective

A number of volunteers have expressed interest in participating in the AGO Volunteer Artist Collective, which I’ve recently established to highlight the skills, creativity and talents of fellow volunteers while also another layer of building on our volunteer community an opportunity for volunteers to get to know your colleagues on another level. This initiative will be rapidly expanding in the new year. Holly and I can’t wait to see it grow, for you all to showcase your talents, your works with fellow volunteers and building the collective together. Volunteer artworks will be displayed in the volunteer lounge adding another layer in addition to your presentation. The collective is open to all levels of artists, be that amateur or professionals, any medium, all are warmly welcome and continuous encouragement! Just simply fill out the form and will be in touch. https://forms.gle/hyYg9cNufBbBo9aH7

Recognition events

Just this month we have had three recognition events, surrounded by the holidays planned by Holly and myself. I’m grateful to Holly for being a staff partner, as a Volunteer and President. Thank you Holly for all you do for us volunteers, behind the scenes, your dedication, effervescent energy, your smile and enthusiasm your wisdom. We are all lucky to have you by our side and ensuring volunteers are together and recognized as we share the mandate of the volunteer community.

Barbara Glaser

Volunteer President

Hello Everyone,

As you know, at the end of each week I send out a message to all staff. Doing this allows me to take a moment and reflect and communicate with everyone. Sometimes my message contains major news – sometimes it contains something more personal – but I do try to keep it real and sincere.

Reflecting on the past year, there were many real highs amidst some choppy moments. Here are some of my CURRENT highlights (in random order and certainly NOT an exhaustive list):

1. The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21^st Century. Last week, I encouraged everyone to go up and see the exhibition – it is bold, fresh and a match for the people of Toronto. It got off to a fantastic start with Michie Mee performing in Walker Court. It was an incredibly popular event — with about 2,500 people in attendance and lineups for the exhibition throughout the night. Curatorially, it is very strong (thank you Julie Crooks and the entire team, including Project Manager, Melissa Ramage), with art by artists that range from the emerging to the well-known.
2. Pacita Abad is such a beautiful exhibition. I love how it takes you on a journey from the overtly political, to wonderfully stylized graphic works, to immersive underwater art quilts. (Thank you Renée van der Avoird and the entire team, including Project Manager, Brittney Sproule).
3. Light Years: The Phil Lind Gift. This is personal for me as I knew Phil quite well. He had a great eye and built his collection over decades with the intention of giving it to the AGO. Many of the works are by some of the best-known Canadian artists as well as international artists such as Ai Wei Wei. (Thank you Adam Welch and the entire team, including Project Manager, Katarina Veljovic).
4. Sonia Boyce: Feeling Her Way. I saw this work a few years ago in Italy at the Venice Biennale and was pleased when it was proposed that it come to the AGO. I confess the first time I saw the work I was not immediately taken with it – but I went back again, gave it time and ended up really liking it. I love how the artist creates a world that is shiny and beautiful and blends in a complex sound scape (thank you Emilie Croning and the entire team, including Project Manager, Hillary Taylor).
5. The Collection. Because these works are on view all the time, sometimes I take them a bit for granted, but they are truly amazing: the Tom Thomsons in the Thomson Canadian galleries, the ivories in Thomson European galleries, the Marchesa Casati by Augustus John, the Mark Rothko on the fourth floor… just to name a few.
6. F&B. December 11^th was the single highest day of sales in AGO Bistro history! We love breaking records!

All these exhibitions and offerings create a beautiful tapestry for our visitors to enjoy. Everyone plays a role in making sure that the AGO is an extraordinary museum for the public. We all have different roles, staff and volunteer, but we all contribute to fulfilling the AGO’s mission of serving our public.

As the year ends, I just want to say thank you.

Stephan

P.S. I encourage you to think about your personal highlights of the year!

Hello Everyone,

Last week was a banner week with opening events for The Culture on Wednesday and Friday evenings. The exhibition looks great and was beautifully launched. It gives me optimism for the holiday season – typically the busiest period of the year. Make sure you zip up to the 5th Floor and see the show.

As you may know, the Joint Working Committee (JWC) is a group of staff and trustees who have spent the past year or so creating a process to identify a new set of values for the AGO. Earlier this week, the JWC met for the final time to discuss these values, which have been informed by staff and volunteer input in last summer’s focus groups. Currently, Leadership Team is developing a roll-out plan to unfold in the first few months of 2025. I want to thank everyone on the JWC, and those of you who participated in focus groups. I am very pleased with how the process has gone.

Take Care,

Stephan

In 1958, music photographer Art Kane brought together 57 prominent jazz musicians on the stoop of a Harlem brownstone to create one of the most important photographs in jazz history. That year, A Great Day in Harlem was published in Esquire magazine, earning Kane numerous accolades for his work. It was so influential that in 1998, XXL magazine commissioned a 40th-anniversary recreation of the seminal group portrait— this time focusing on hip hop. Shot by legendary African American photographer Gordon Parks, A Great Day in Hip Hop (1998) featured over 200 of the genre’s biggest names, from Rakim to E-40, and was published as the centrefold of XXL’s December 1998 issue. 

In conjunction with the Toronto edition of the landmark exhibition The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, the AGO commissioned Canadian hip hop photographer Patrick Nichols to be the next torchbearer of the Great Day tradition. On August 14, 2024, Nichols gathered 103 key figures from three decades of Toronto hip hop for a massive group portrait on the steps of the Toronto heritage building, The Liberty Grand.

Described by Nichols as “a way to give back,” A Great Day in Toronto Hip Hop features a diverse group of MCs, DJs, break dancers, graffiti writers, promoters, designers and media personalities— most of whom he considers personal friends. Among them are the founder of Canada’s first-ever hip hop radio show, Ron Nelson; gold record-selling artists Choclair and Saukretes; and owner of the iconic vinyl shop, Play De Record, Eugene Tam. This monumental portrait is the AGO exhibition’s grand finale, prompting visitors to witness and acknowledge the forebears of the Toronto hip hop community before they exit. 

• Exclusive Member Access: Friday December 20, 2024
• Annual Passholder and General Admission: Saturday December 21
• Located on Level 1 in Gallery 139 – 142

EXHIBITION OVERVIEW

Exploring the many ways that the French artist James Tissot represented modern women and envisioned their relationship to time during the last decades of the nineteenth century, this exhibition presents two of the AGO’s most beloved Tissot paintings alongside a selection of more than 40 works on paper donated by Allan and Sondra Gotlieb. The contradiction of the period come alive in these works, as the quickness of modernity, exemplified by the newfound speed of travel, fashion and commodity culture, is juxtaposed against the constrained pace of women’s everyday lives, characterized by the wait to find a husband, caregiving, tending to customers or recovering from illness.

Curated by Mary Hunter, Associate Professor, McGill University and by Alexa Greist, AGO Curator and R. Fraser Elliott Chair, Prints & Drawings, and Caroline Shields, AGO Curator of European Art, this exhibition illustrates the many ways that time, and a gendered understanding of it, shaped women’s identities.

Hello Volunteers,

On November 20^th we launched the Volunteer Artist Collective, which was most exciting! Our first featured artist was Janne Reuss, engaging on Zoom with a group of volunteers on her exquisite work, her back story, personal anecdotes, and creative process. Janne has been a Gallery Guide at the AGO for ten years and has also been a gallery guide in Germany. Her work is focused on photography through a contemporary lens, although she paints as well. Personally, I love the juxtaposition of the images as a collage, mixed together with her back story incorporating nature and flow. A constant theme in Janne’s work is her interest in human nature and how memories and experiences are imprinted deep inside of us. If you missed the presentation it was recorded. 

Janne’s website: http://www.artjanne.com. 

This purpose of the AGO Volunteer Artist Collective is to engage fellow volunteers who are artists in a collective, giving them the opportunity to present their work to fellow volunteers, and even display their work, which we all can enjoy and interact with, in the Volunteer Lounge.  

Our next artist to be featured will be the talented Aliye Akbarzade, who equally articulates her life experiences and personal story creatively with focus into her paintings.  (Look for a date in February, soon to be shared).

We have a few volunteers who have informally expressed interest in participating to Holly and myself, and we are strongly encouraging all volunteer artists to participate. All levels of art are welcome – you do not need to be a professional artist to participate! – whether you are new, emerging, established, amateur, or professional – we would love to feature you in the AGO Volunteer Artist Collective!

The process is expressing your interest, (via the form below) which will prompt a conversation with the Volunteer President initially, then the presentation which can be organized either online via Zoom, or in person.  

Please fill out this expression of interest /submission form and we will be in touch: https://forms.gle/hyYg9cNufBbBo9aH7

Thanks to all for your interest and participation!  

Best,

Barbara Glaser 

Volunteer President 

Opening this week, The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, with access as follows:

• Exclusive Member Access: December 4 -6
• Exclusive Member & Annual Passholder Access: December: December 7 – January 5, 2025
• General Admission for All: January 7 – April 6, 2025

Exhibition Overview

Immersing viewers in the world of hip-hop through contemporary art and fashion, The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century brings together contemporary artists, musicians, designers and stylists to tell the story of the art form and its global impact on visual culture.

Organized on the occasion of Hip Hop’s fiftieth anniversary and featuring contemporary art by some of today’s most important and celebrated artists, including Derrick Adams, John Edmonds, Deana Lawson and Hank Willis Thomas, this dynamic and wide-ranging exhibition highlights the art form’s ongoing conceptual and material innovation. Placing fashion, consumer marketing, music, videos and objects in dialogue with paintings, sculpture, poetry, photography and multi-media installations, the exhibition considers activism and racial identity, notions of bling and swagger, as well as gender, sexuality and feminism. 

The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century is co-organized by the Baltimore Museum of Art and Saint Louis Art Museum. The Toronto presentation is organized by the Art Gallery of Ontario. The AGO presentation will be organized by Julie Crooks, Curator, Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora, AGO.

To Learn More About the Show, Watch the Exhibition Launch video, shared below. Please note, you will be asked for a password to view, please enter this password (exactly as typed, here): AGO+Cultur3

https://artcloud.ago.ca/index.php/s/Qd3myR8W6oMwbPG

ORDER OF SPEAKERS:

• Melissa Ramage, Project Manager, Exhibition – Exhibition and Team introduction
• Julie Crooks, Curator, Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora – Exhibition overview, big idea, and exhibition walkthrough 
• Emilie Croning, Curatorial Assistant, Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora – Visitor outcomes and graphic design 
• Amy Wu – Exhibition Marketing  
• Bojana Stancic, Program Curator, Performance and Live, and Melissa Ramage – Opening week and programming  
• Allison Miller, Manager, Corporate Partnerships – Development and donor engagement 

Join us: Wednesday December 11, 6pm

This presentation has been organized as a recognition event for all volunteers, to come together and enjoy a favourite show, before the holidays. Learn more about these vibrant works, and the life of this daring and charismatic Artist who travelled the world! An expressive painter and master of the narrative quilt, Abad was also fiercely political, creating work that referenced multiculturalism and immigration.

This is an in-gallery, Curator’s Tour, organized exclusively for all AGO volunteers. We will have the galleries mic’d – so you can enjoy a walk and talk with Renee throughout the galleries and looking at the works in more detail (and you will be able to hear it all!) No need to register for this one, just drop-in. We look forward to seeing you there!

*Please note: Because this is an in-gallery tour – by volunteer request – we regret we cannot record this event. Please make plans to join us if you can. Wednesday evening volunteers – please come and enjoy as part of your shift!

Hello everyone,

It is nearly the start of a new month. This is a busy time at the AGO and I am really proud of the content we will be sharing with our public this holiday season.

Next week, I go on my final business trip of the calendar year. I will be in Lyon and Paris with Bizot Group, which is comprised of the Directors of the top 50 or so museums internationally, and we will be discussing the evolving role of museums in contemporary society. I will also have the opportunity to share the AGO experience of adopting the Bizot Green Protocols to reduce carbon use in our building operations, while maintaining a safe environment for artwork preservation.

Take care,

Stephan

Hello Volunteers! Last week we were happy to have Artist and AGO Gallery Guide Janne Reuss join us for the launch of the AGO Volunteer Artist Collective – an opportunity for all artists across the volunteer program to share their work with each other. We recorded this session for those that couldn’t attend but wanted to hear about Janne and her work, in her own words. It was a remarkable presentation, shared HERE (click on this link to view): Janne Reuss AGO Volunteer Artist Collective talk

Thank you, Janne! Our next guest Artist to present in the AGO Volunteer Artist Collection is Alieh Akbarzadeh. Watch for a date in the new year.