culture
The Better Way to Make CONTACT
“Hello in there. You, yes: don’t go! I’ve been wanting to talk to you. Can you see me now?”
For most commuters, hopping on the streetcar is routine. Flash the pass, eyes jump to the first available seat. Then it’s sit-music-book until the final destination. But if passengers on the #4114 could lift their eyes skyward for a moment, they’d be greeted with this cry for communication. And a whole lot more.
All month long, in place of the advertisements usually lining the length of streetcar #4114, Jordan Bower is asking the question “What does it mean to be a human being?”
It’s a question he was seeking out himself as he snapshot his way through through three separate trips to India and Nepal between 2007 and 2009. His answer is found in his first ever exhibit as a self-titled photographer, on display this month as part of the CONTACT Photography Festival.
This year’s CONTACT’s theme of “Pervasive Influence” asks how the photograph constructs and shapes our reality, and in the case of this exhibition, the Western relationship with the rest of the world—specifically, the developing world.
“The images we see make us feel guilty. We’re always told we need to help, that the world out there is scary for the poor, and that we’re lucky to be able to live without those problems. Some of that’s true, but there’s also a lot of humanity,” Bower said, with an overwhelming enthusiasm that is just too endearing to be fake.
There’s no guilt to be found on board #4114, but onlookers also aren’t made to commend the subjects’ ability to find joy amid their poverty. The people in Bower’s photos, from the young to the ancient, the spiritual to the mundane, are not found in extremes. Two men look annoyed as they’re caught mid-smoke in a slum, another man displays his thirteen fingers to the camera with a grin, a child drapes herself over her mother’s knees. None are exactly in the throes of emotion, either positive or negative, but that doesn’t make them any less moving. The power of the photos lies in that they are simply…being. They are living their lives as they know them.
“We get caught up in the ‘bestness’ of our experience, because they’re poorer, we think they’re worse off. But the people in India would look at me like I was the one who was screwed up, who was different. Life is just life,” he said.
The story of the business-school-grad-turned-nomad reaching his epiphany overseas is one we’ve heard before. His message sounds a little familiar. And the images he captured, well, we’ve probably seen them before, too, in one way or another. But in the context of a photo festival dedicated to Marshall McLuhan,”the medium is the message.” And this medium is off the beaten tracks. A self-proclaimed idealist, Bower just wanted to show what he learned to as many people in his hometown of Toronto as possible, and he thought there’s no venue more accessible to the public at large than the red rocket itself.
Using a streetcar as an art space is a new thing for the CONTACT festival, and there are a few reasons for that. Backlighting issues have left some images in the dark *, the surfer stance is not the most comfortable when taking in the artwork, and changing schedules and no GPS puts finding the streetcar almost entirely in the hands of fate. Bower can only tweet the car’s whereabouts for interested CONTACT-ers. In a way, a streetcar is the total opposite of the traditional gallery—it’s only available to those who don’t actively seek it out. Which is just the audience Bower is seeking, if only they would notice.
“About 85-90% of riders don’t look up. It’s a little hopeless. I know I won’t reach 99.9% of people, it sucks. But I’m getting used to it.”
Jordan Bower.
Such words are the closest Bower ever gets to defeatism during our conversation over tea in the Distillery District. Facing an identity crisis during his travels, he adopted the title of “lovewallah”—the purveyor of love to his community. It was in this spirit that he decided to fund the exhibit out of his own pocket, what he now estimates to be about three thousand dollars. Nor is he expecting to make any money or fame out of it—his name can’t even be found anywhere on the streetcar. He says his only wish is for Torontonians to clear the Big Smoke from around our heads and look at the world in a new, open way.
With enthusiastic waves and a big “Hello!” to passersby, they usually answer with an uncomfortable “Urummff, hellooo…?” This lovewallah’s got some work to do. But the odd impromptu art discussion in the back of #4114, or a woman who told him his photos brightened her day, make it all worth it for Bower.
As for what it means to be a human being—it’s a loaded question for someone exhausted, on their way home from a long day at work. But if commuters can’t find the answer right away, that’s fine with Bower. Just as long as they start thinking in a global sense. Especially, he says, as Canadians become known internationally for our ecological damage rather than our “niceness.”
It just starts with a change from the routine. Maybe a look up from the book, or taking the ear buds out. Or go back to that first panel—the one calling out.
“I wanted to introduce myself. I wanted to ask you how you were feeling. I thought maybe we could get to know each other. And I thought…can you hear me? Hello?”
Photos by Josh Newman.
<a name="asterisk"* The exhibit was originally placed on streetcar #4025, but the TTC changed cars after persistent lighting issues. Jordan Bower takes back all the bad things he ever said about the TTC and their employees.