Beginning Wednesday, the newest "librarians-in-residence" at the Toronto Free Library will be the conceptual comedy duo Life of a Craphead (Amy Lam and Jon McCurley). These are the guys responsible for installing the most remote Queen Video location ever at the Leslie Spit (near the lighthouse, where someone actually went to rent Y Tu Mama Tambien). They've also erected a giant exploding paper-mache volcano at Trinity Bellwoods and carved out rumble strips on Yonge......

When trying to solve the problem of the lack of affordable housing, the thinkers and planners and innovators and design enthusiasts come up with some pretty creative ideas. Like the IKEA House, for example, or the notion of shipping container architecture. A group of Toronto activists are proposing a "use it or lose it" bylaw "that would see vacant and underutilized buildings and spaces expropriated by the City and redeveloped as badly needed affordable......

The Gallerist is Torontoist's new bi-weekly arts listings. Starting January 31st, check back every other Wednesday for a new batch of events. Last Thursday local painter Colin Druhan hosted a busy and boozy reception at Katharine Mulherin's secondary space on Queen West. His work (see 'Hail Satan' at right) features mainly portraits of fashionable men and sinister women, but there are a few friendly looking dog portraits scattered within the small space. Sharing the gallery......

Tonight, the Toronto Public Space Committee's Streets to Screens series wraps up with a screening of Ron Mann's Rochdale College doc Dream Tower: "Rochdale College was one of the most controversial experiments ever to have taken place in Canada. Set up as a combined free university and student residence, the eighteen-storey building at the southeastern corner of Bloor & Huron Streets in downtown Toronto opened in the fall of 1968 – at the height of......

Almost 80,000 high school students applied to Ontario universities this year, and the universities are using the surge as a powerful bargaining chip. If you're a student of the University of Toronto, you'll know that the current strategy for dealing with this increase in enrollment is to pack the students in tight. With their debt climbing into the $100-million range, universities are demanding financial assistance from the government or they will stop accepting so......

Tonight, the Toronto Public Space Committee presents the fifth of six films screening at the Bloor Cinema as part of its ongoing Streets to Screens fundraising film series (which also includes monthly screenings of public space-themed NFB shorts at the Toronto Free Gallery). The theme of the evening is Workspace: Public Space, and the feature presentation is the Toronto premiere of Robin and Rory Muir's Downtown Locals, a documentary following a year in the lives......

The subject on everyone's mind at Spacing this morning is Regent Park's revitalization project. Our favourite public space newswire will be featuring a series of documentaries on YouTube called Regent Park TV, a project by the Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre. The Toronto Public Space Committee will be screening another series on Regent Park at the Toronto Free Gallery on Thursday, December 14 @ 7:30. "You better be going to school this......

This week Torontoist presents extended literary event listings – you get till Sunday the 27th at no additional cost – as I’m out of town until the end of August. Tonight, Jerry Schaefer presents The Flash Fiction Comedy Jam, which is apparently flash fiction read by a bunch of Toronto comics. Intriguing. Additionally, there’ll be a “live writing contest” and an appearance by storyteller Mark Jenkins. It takes place at Bad Dog Theatre – 138......

Torontoist is telling you to ignore the confusing name for this event and instead focus on the fact that it looks like it'll be a fun and fashionable evening. The Terminus 1525 sponsored I Am A Wild Party is being held at the Toronto Free Gallery tomorrow night which pretty much guarantees that it'll be fun. But just to ensure this Terminus 1525 is launching two projects at the event. The first is CVP:Trial......

That's the question that Broken Pencil asks in its latest issue, which they're launching tonight, 7pm at the Toronto Free Gallery. The launch will also include a panel discussion on this very same question with art critic RM Vaughan, Shawn Micallef, Photo blogger Matt O'Sullivan and Brenda Goldstein. Goldstein, coincidentally, or not so coincidentally is also the curator of the Centre Cannot Hold show currently running at Toronto Free Gallery.......

Could you imagine what would happen if we suddenly had to leave our urban and surburban sprawl. What you would it look like many years later if we returned? This is one of the many thoughts explored at the Centre Cannot Hold show at the Toronto Free Gallery which opened last night.......

One of the complaints of the Toronto arts scene is that it's far too downtown-centric. Yet interestingly many of its artists, and many many Torontonians actually come from and some still live in the suburbs. Couple this with the gentrification happening all over downtown Toronto and you can come to the conclusion that sooner or later artists will be priced out of their downtown live/work spaces and crappy basement apartments. This is what Brenda Goldstein,......

Torontoist wants all of you to take a deep breath and relax. We also think you should go see the opening of The Cult of Speed Meets The Slow Movement at Toronto Free Gallery tonight 8-10pm (660 Queen E.). The group show features work from artists such as Franco DeFrancesca, Fran Freeman, Brenda Goldstein all on the theme of slowness in contemporary society. We'd also be remiss if we didn't mention that fellow Torontoist contributor......

A few reasons why you should check out In Transit, opening tonight at the Toronto Free Gallery (660 Queen St. E.) 1) More TTC love Despite jacking up the fares and crumbling infrastructure, the TTC needs more love than ever. Boy Reporter has lived in a city where the transit workers went on strike for three months and the buses stop running after 2:00AM so he appreciates the fact that the TTC hasn't done......

Is transit in Toronto on the upswing for 2006? A few weeks ago an eye weekly editorial admits "the TTC is getting better", and several upcoming events and publications by the usual suspects promise more transit celebration: The Toronto Public Space Committee presents What The TTC Could Be: an art exhibit, featuring a new TTC where ads have been replaced by imagination. XPACE Gallery. January 5th to 8th. Opening night: January 6th, 7pm to......

Tall Poppy Interview: Gayla Trail, author/photographer, You Grow Girl...

The Tall Poppy Interview - Rannie Turingan, Photojunkie...

Local Junkie of the Photos Rannie Turingan is having a very good week. Yesterday the photoblogger par excellence, who spends his free time coralling the typepad troops as unofficial caretaker of the GTA Bloggers, won Best Canadian blog on the Bloggies. (Shoutouts also to Sam Javanrouh's Daily Dose of Imagery, which won the awkwardly named 'Best Photography of a Weblog Award') And tomorrow a show featuring work by both Rannie and Sam, and a handful......