Serene emptiness

Explore the AGO’s recently acquired serigraph series The House on Piccadilly Street in our upcoming exhibition

How do the feelings of comfort and claustrophobia come together in a piece of art? This complex combination is explored in the upcoming focused exhibition, Kim Ondaatje: The House on Piccadilly Street, opening July 24 at the AGO.

The scenes depicted in The House on Piccadilly Street were inspired by Ondaatje’s Victorian home in London, Ontario. Though the screenprinting series was made between 1967 and 1969, the vacant rooms devoid of people may feel familiar to us today. As we’re spending more time indoors during periods of social distancing and self-isolation due to the pandemic, the emptiness depicted by Ondaatje reflects the emotions of the new normal felt by many people, like a sense of time is slowly lost.

Read more in AGOinsider, linked here.