The Quarterly

Volume 1, Number 1

Urban Visions

An exhibition of images selected by Jane Jacobs from the Art Gallery of Ontario

Simcoe Street, Toronto 1971

By Eric Freifeld (Canadian 1919-1984)
Charcoal and watercolour on wove paper
Gift of Dr. A.D. Taliano, St. Catherines, Ontario 1973

Used by permission of the AGO

"This is a wonderful picture of what there is to love about Toronto. There are lots of streets that coney this feeling of unpretentious but civilised architecture which isn't flashy and yet isn't dull, with the greenery, the urban forest that is so important. You just know that people who live there or children who were brought up there think of it as home. It is a humane city."
~ Jane Jacobs

East Side Old York Street c. 1930

By Rowley Walter Murphy (Canadian 1891-1975)
Graphite, watercolour and gouache on laid paper

Used by permission of the AGO

"This mixture of old and new makes a wonderful statement that the city is alive, that is always changing. You hate to see the old things go because they are such a reminder of how it was. When they are put into pictures, we hae a recollection of the past. We ought to pay more attention to remembering the past in Canadian cities. An old building needn't have been connected with somebody eminent or some great historical event. It was connected with history. It was connected with the past. This work seems to me to be an almost miraculously preserved bit of memory that says so much."
~ Jane Jacobs