When digital design and street art combine
An interview with Nuff
Photo credit: Nuff
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See where this art used to be on the city's map.
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This mural, called Peep, was created when the real estate company Hullmark was installing office spaces at what was once the Museum of Contemporary Art. Peep was installed in 2017 to add some art to a construction hoarding: a temporary structure meant to keep the public safe during an active construction zone. Because hoardings are temporary, this piece is no longer in existence, as Hullmark completed the construction zone. View more of Nuff's projects on his website.
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Asha Swann 00:00
On this episode of Toronto's Artery, I spoke with an artist who creates under the name Nuff, who's created illustrations, digital art and murals, just to name a few. We spoke about how Toronto's art scene has evolved over the years branching out of what was once just Kensington Market.
Asha Swann 00:17
Were you always leaning towards creative projects when you were growing up?
Nuff 00:21
The short answer is yes. Yeah, I think I was. I didn't necessarily lean towards it academically. I was more scientifically inclined, but I was always drawing, I was always making things.
Asha Swann 00:32
Did you ever have a defining moment where you switched away from like sciences and more towards art, where you were like, "Oh, this is for sure what I want to do with my life?"
Nuff 00:41
Oh, no, I'm still—I'm still not sure. I could be a scientist tomorrow. I think it was more about integration than anything. Throughout school I kind of, was back and forth between the sciences and the arts, and figuring out that I can incorporate technology into something more creative—like digital design or installation art—was kind of the moment when the two started to work together, I guess.
Asha Swann 01:01
Have you had any favourite projects so far, that really, really stand out to you that you've done?
Nuff 01:06
It's kind of hard to, for me to look at something fondly once it's finished, at least for a few years. So I'd say I've had projects that I've really enjoyed doing while I was doing them.
Asha Swann 01:17
Did you find that during COVID, when everyone and everything was locked down, do you feel like that kind of helped you feel more creative or kind of hindered that?
Nuff 01:25
I think the first few months of lockdown were, were tough—and then almost spontaneously, like projects would kind of explode out of nowhere? Yeah, it almost felt like, literally an immune response at times, where I'd just wake up with the need to make something and within a few hours, like knock out the project. So yeah, it was a bit of both.
Asha Swann 01:45
And have you gravitated more towards certain mediums over the last few years of your career? Like I know some people are more focused recently on like spray paints, or I know some other people are doing more of like a digital design type of thing. Yeah, any sort of medium you've been leaning more towards recently?
Nuff 02:02
My professional background is digital design and graphic design. When I started making murals and installation artwork, that was kind of response to being burned out at work. And for a few years, I just wanted to make physical things with my hands. Because I was sat in front of a computer all the time, I'd say it's swung back towards the middle now where I'm happy to do more digital projects, especially like experimental stuff with you know, AR [augmented reality], or any kind of like, technological new interesting thing. But definitely for a while, I was—I was very biased towards making physical objects.
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Asha Swann 02:35
Do you have any dream spots, either in the city or anywhere in the world, where you would really love to do like something outdoors, like a large-scale mural, or anything like that?
Nuff 02:45
Bucket list thing for me would be to paint in Brooklyn for kind of historical and almost spiritual reasons. There's a large community active currently, but it's also just historically kind of the birthplace of street art, or at least of a certain kind of street art. And so it's, it's a very inspiring thing to kind of walk around.
Asha Swann 03:03
Have you noticed the outdoor street art scene changing at all in Toronto, since you've been here like, or have you noticed that kind of grow or gravitate in a certain direction at all?
Nuff 03:13
It's definitely grown, I think you can kind of look down a lot of major streets in Toronto, and pretty much every wallet or every other wall has a mural on it. So from that perspective, I think I've seen just like a spread of art, and also spread of the kinds of stuff you're seeing. There's a lot more mainstreaming of graffiti writing or text-based street art, as well as a lot of businesses will do murals that are, you know, about their business. So it's been accepted by like the commercial landowners or property owners as well, which is, which is really cool. I've been in Toronto for seven years. And when I got here, it was kind of like Kensington Market was the only place—and Graffiti Alley—were kind of the only places that you had any consistency of street art and mural art. And it feels like you know, now Dundas West, Bloor Street, in the Junction, there's like seven or eight neighborhoods, you can sort of walk around. And even on like, Queen West, if you go into any of the alleys or the garages, those are painted. It just feels like it's spread a lot further.
Peep on Queen St W
Image source: Nuff
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This photo, taken from across the street, shows a different angle of the artwork in which the construction is more visible. The blinds are painted in a way that it blends into the scaffolding surrounding the construction project.
Asha Swann 04:11
How do you find that having so much visible public art has impacted the community?
Nuff 04:16
I don't really know what the before state was. So I can only—I can only make assumptions based on like, what I feel presently. I definitely think there's a lot more interest. You know, people have their favourite artists, they recognize people from seeing them repeatedly all over the city. They follow artists, either like on social media or online or they follow them around events around the city. And that seems like something that's only really possible when, when there's like a proliferation.
Asha Swann 04:43
I can definitely see that. Yeah.
Nuff 04:44
But when I first got here, there was a restaurant doing these art and food outdoor events, and they would give away a limited number of prints from artists that they had relationships with. I looked them up and these were like the people I was following when I first got here. And it's really cool to follow their careers and see how—because of things like that, because of some mainstream outlet—giving them that platform, they've been able to grow and develop and have a much larger following. And then getting to meet some of these people as I got into that world and like talking to them, it's been really cool to see how the business community or like the culture community have kind of helped build platforms for those people.
Asha Swann 05:22
That is really cool to see. I feel like a lot of the time that is kind of overlooked of how the businesses might react to having art on their walls, because I think it's normal for businesses not to want that. So seeing at least a change in the last few years, at least a couple of years that I've been here, I've definitely noticed that maybe businesses are more open to having like their storefronts painted or things like that, which I think is really cool.
Nuff 05:44
This is like a particularly Toronto thing. I don't I don't want sort of people to develop an ego over this. But it's like a particularly Toronto thing, because we have like the 50% public art legislation—that applies to any new construction project, needs to have at least 50% public art on the building holdings. There's like the BIA funding for beautification and like, anti-vandalism, which is a weird thing to say, if you're going to put street art on your wall, but you know what I'm saying. There's like, actually funds from the city to beautify any public-facing facades. This is something that business improvement areas—which I think is also a Toronto concept — so it's kind of written into, like the bylaws of the city, which is, which is really cool.
Asha Swann 06:28
Oh, yeah, it's definitely really cool. And then other artists that I talked to were saying that just in the last few years, Toronto has been doing a lot to promote local art and public art, which I think is super cool. And really a creative way to go about it.
Nuff 06:41
Yeah, the city has a public art plan for the rest of this decade, which again, is like fairly progressive, interesting, forward thinking stuff. So 2021, I guess, thanks to COVID was the year of public art. But then the rest of this decade is also going to be prioritizing, allocating, like, funds and space to artists working in the public realm, which again, is like credit where it's due. It's not something I would expect from the government. It's pretty cool.
Asha Swann 06:42
Yeah, definitely cool, for sure. I was wondering if you have any upcoming projects, like later this year, or even like in the spring or summer that you're working on, that you think people should check out?
Nuff 07:19
Yeah, so—so right now I'm kind of obsessed with time, and with the wait time is tracked. As you may know, during the pandemic, we sort of lost a sense of the flow of time. And so I've been working basically on making a bunch of clocks and other time pieces. The first two things that are kind of coming out will be a series of wall clocks that do not behave the way they're supposed to. And then also a series of sand timers, of hourglasses—but also don't behave the way they supposed to. And these will be hopefully done this year, at some point. So if you're listening to this, and the clocks are ready, go have a look at them.
Asha Swann 07:58
This has been an episode of Toronto's Artery, a podcast about art in the heart of the city. For more episodes, and to see a map of the art we discussed in today's episode, head to torontosartery.com.
Thanks for listening!