Acts of Kindness (2026) is an antidote to the threatening times we live in. It is set during winter in a photo of Clarence Square in downtown Toronto.* The Square originally had working class homes, but the houses were renovated in 1968. They are now apartments and small businesses.
The narrative is of everyday actions in an era of destabilizing threats. A kind of visual small talk: giving strangers directions, offering food to guests, welcoming new immigrants, helping an elder or a person who’s fallen, and people whose jobs are to care and assist. It contains our humanity and solidarity.
The characters placed in the windows of the houses are of some of the historic and contemporary artists/activists who have had an influence on the artist’s life and work (and who are not already acting in the image).
* The subject of a 1910 painting A Row of Houses, Wellington Street (Street Painting I) by Canadian artist Lawren Harris (the image is incorporated into the work).