5/23/2011 10:36:22 AM

May 19, 2011

Get interactive with Doors Open Toronto 2011

This year's photography-themed 12th edition of Doors Open Toronto on Saturday, May 28 and Sunday, May 29 has many free interactive opportunities for the public. Highlights include a photography contest, an "Ask a Photographer" program, talks by notable architectural photographers, performances by five ensembles drawn from Toronto's internationally acclaimed Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, and more.

Complete details - dates, times, locations - for the programs highlighted below and for the many other photography events taking place this year, are available at http://www.toronto.ca/doorsopen/events.htm.

"Doors Open Toronto Photography Contest: City in Focus 2011" encourages anyone 18 years or older to submit up to four photographs taken at official Doors Open Toronto buildings during the 2011 event. Winning photographs will be selected in four categories: best building exterior, best building interior, best architectural detail and best door. A professional panel will select the winning photos, which will be announced and published in the Toronto Star in late June and in the City's Our Toronto publication.

Visit http://www.toronto.ca/doorsopen for contest rules, regulations, categories and instructions for submitting photos.

"Ask a Photographer" is an initiative involving expert photographers at select venues who will be available to talk about their work and to offer architectural photography advice.

Participants in Ask a Photographer include:
- documentary photographer and pin hole camera specialist Tod Ainslie
- architectural and travel photographer Tom Arban
- black-and-white specialist Andy Brooks
- fine art photographer Russell Brohier
- commercial and performance photographer Michael Cooper
- black-and-white photography by David Drake
- architectural photographer Shai Gill
- psychogeographer, photographer and panographer Aleksandar Janicijevic
- architectural and commercial photographer Richard Johnson, who will talk about his "Ice Huts" series
- landscape and architectural photographer Simeon Poseon, talking about and demonstrating his large format cameras
- fine art photographer Eugen Sakhenko
- renowned portrait photographer Al Gilbert.

Members of Toronto's acclaimed Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra will engage in 30-minute live performances at five locations. Performers include violinist Genevieve Gilardeau, cellist Christina Mahler and lute player Lucas Harris; violinists Aisslinn Nosky and Cristina Zacharias joined by cellist Felix Deak; violinists Patricia Ahern and Christopher Verrette joined by Borys Medicky on harpsichord; viola d'amore by Thomas Georgi and Lucas Harris on lute; and oboists John Abberger and Marco Cera joined by Dominic Teresi on bassoon.

Toronto City Hall has many activities scheduled throughout the weekend. Visitors can take a self-guided tour (which includes the Mayor's Office and the 27th floor Observation Deck) and view "Toronto's Visual Legacy: Official City Photography from 1856-2008."

Children can tour City Hall through a scavenger hunt, using clues to locate various features and locations. The Toronto Camera Club offers free workshops including: "A Different Way of Looking" by David Foster: "Architecture through the Ages - from Classical Greek to 21st Century" by Robert Shechter; "Photographing Urban Landscapes - Creating Compelling Images" by Jeffrey Canto-Thaler; and "Analysis and Design of Photographs" with Leo Mascarinas. There are also free hands-on daily workshops with Lomography Canada and the Toronto Museum Project Online - http://www.torontomuseumproject.ca - hosts a hands-on open house in City Hall's Committee Room 3.

Diaspora Dialogues hosts a weekend long interactive art installation and panel at the R.C. Harris Water Treatment Plant. Both will explore what as a society we collectively decide to forget and what we choose to hold onto through memory and its embodiment in our physical city. Using the metaphor of infrastructure, The "Forgetful City" runs all weekend. The public are invited to contribute photos or stories to be incorporated into the evolving installation for that weekend.

John Lyle's granddaughter Lorna Harris will be at Runnymede Library and Union Station to talk about this acclaimed architect's career, the design of Union Station and John Lyle's role as a cultural nationalist. Both buildings are fine examples of two distinct periods of his career. Guides from the Toronto Society of Architects will give free 20-minute mini-tours of towers near City Hall on May 29. Tours start at City Hall.

Doors Open Toronto officially launches on May 27 at the Royal Ontario Museum, which is opens for free from 4:30 to 8:30 p.m., excluding its ticketed event called "Water: The Exhibition." After opening remarks by Dean Goodman of Levitt Goodman Architects, notable architectural photographers Peter MacCallum. Peter A. Sellar and Cindy Blazevic will speak about their work in the ROM Lecture Theatre.

The public can also interact with Doors Open Toronto through its Facebook and Twitter pages. Mobile applications may also become available. Link to them through http://www.toronto.ca/doorsopen.

Doors Open Toronto is a popular, annual city-wide celebration that features free public access to 150 architecturally, historically, culturally and socially significant buildings. Doors Open Toronto has attracted more than 1.9 million visitors since it began and was the first North American city to launch a Doors Open event. Doors Open Toronto is produced by the City of Toronto and sponsored by The Toronto Star. Media sponsor: Citytv and OMNI Television.