Tumult Arts Festival hit Gould Street on Thursday, bringing performance art, poetry, graffiti and installation art to Ryerson. As the sun set over Ryerson campus, students walking through were greeted by DJs spinning old school hip hop and reggae, an outdoor café and a competition by Art Battle Toronto.
Brodie Metcalfe, the RSU event co-ordinator, created the event because he wanted “a collaborative, multidisciplinary art festival.” There was live painting, live music and interactive installations. Scroll through for a look at the event.
1. Tumult Temple
Asia Clarke and the Wildmoon Collective created a temple that reflects our tumultuous times. The Tumult Temple used draped ripped fabric, dripping candles and burning incense to create the space.
2. Live painting
In the centre of it all, pop artist JessGo did a live painting of dancer Natalie Dee. The artist brought her work to the street and created a dress on Dee and painted her body in fluorescent colours. They had a drummer to draw in an audience and add some fanfare to the performance. “Music is everything. We can’t do it alone,” JessGo said.
3. Graffiti Gene
Gene One is a well-known artist within Toronto’s graffiti scene and he brought his expertise with an installation that allowed Ryerson students to dabble in basic graffiti skills. He used sugar cane paint that is less toxic and created an outline that he let students fill in. “Two freshman girls came up to me and tried it out and told me that they want to get into graf [graffiti] now.”
4. Dress tech
Stefania Stefanakou and Holly Chang both work at the Digital Media Experience Lab on campus and used their tech savvy to bring technology to the arts festival. Stefanakou, a graduate of Ryerson’s Fashion Communication program, created a dress using wearable technology and coding that created a light display by mimicking a person’s movements.
5. Drawbot
Chang, a third year Creative Industries student, created a drawbot – a robot that would take a photograph and reimagine it by drawing it out. She took photos of students and the drawbot created portraits.
6. Battling artists
Hip-hop violinist Yosvani Castañeda brought his eclectic revamp of classical music to the stage during the Art Battle.
The night culminated with a painting competition hosted by Art Battle Toronto at Lake Devo. They held three rounds and all artists were given 20 minutes to create their masterpieces.
Kelsey Adams is a journalist from Toronto with feature, arts, music and fashion writing skills and visual storytelling skills. You'll find her standing on chairs to get the perfect Instagram picture of her food and strolling the streets late at night listening to Blood Orange. She has a lowkey obsession with skate culture and she's a sucker for a good underdog story.