TTC Public Art Program

Art is an important component of major station upgrades (including the Easier Access and Second Exit construction improvement projects). The TTC’s public art programs have had a transformative effect on the city’s vitality, assembling a collection of public art that, in its scale and diversity, is of international significance.

Public art concepts for stations are selected by art juries including one local representative for each station. During selection periods, the concepts will be available for viewing on this site. Following committee and community selection, the concepts and public feedback are presented to the TTC Board for approval. The selected artists will then develop the artwork with TTC Chief Architect and the TTC construction project teams prior to installation.

This program is an integral part of the TTC’s Graffiti Management Plan, successful in reducing graffiti vandalism and replacing it with vibrant, colourful, community-engaged street art.

All Stations that have received public art installations are in accordance with the TTC Public Art Policy outlined in this Approval of Art Concepts Board report.

Public art is being provided at five stations as part of the Easier Access Phase III (EAIII) and Second Exit (SE) projects. For more details, view the staff report from the April 11, 2024 board meeting.

Chester Station

Katharine Harvey: FLORAE

FLORAE is a series of wall mosaics and art glass elements that serve to reflect the community that inhabits the Chester subway neighbourhood. The area is full of parks and green spaces, and the residents take pride in their gardens. Inspired by native plants and flowers of the area, the artwork draws from the sugar maple, eastern cottonwood, butternut tree, yellow coltsfoot flower, and red skunk cabbage, among many other species. Shifting and cascading hues depict the florae in changing seasons.
King Station

Sean Martindale: Light Canopy

Light Canopy is an animated lighting system set into the ceiling above the stairwell at King Station’s western entrance. As pedestrians pass under, they will experience the feeling of being under sun dappled trees, with beams reflecting and passing through foliage. The dynamic, animated band of light is made up of an array of programmed LEDs spanning the underside of a diffusing semi-translucent surface. Light Canopy will be programmed to follow natural circadian light cycles. The artwork will be continually changing; a piece that the public will get to experience in new ways each time they see it.
Runnymede Station

Elicser Elliot: Anonymous Somebody

Anonymous Somebody captures the snippets of our bustling Bloor West Village lives while standing still. The artwork aims to communicate the story of individual spirt as fresh and relevant to the metabolism of the neighbourhood. The images work as an anchor to a thought or memory for the person viewing it - to commemorate, celebrate, provoke, and heal. Not unlike Runnymede, a house that became a community, Anonymous Somebody welcomes all passengers to reframe the characters’ experience as they pass or wait, fluidly transitioning from past lives to present, making the artwork their own.
Sherbourne Station

Rebecca Bayer: The Whole is Greater than the Sum of its Parts

The mosaics offer a friendly invitation to all people in the universal language of colours and geometric triangular patterns. The proposed artwork will be a series of colourful mosaic wall panels based on patterns derived from local community workshops. This project conceptually embodies the interdependence of parts within the whole. The panels will be fabricated from custom ceramic tiles, and applied at various locations throughout the station. Sherbourne station is an important transit hub for the multicultural neighbourhoods it serves and this proposed artwork intends to reaffirm the station as a shared place where the wider community interacts daily.
Wilson Station

LeuWebb: Outside the Lines

Outside the Lines is born of the language and materials of the subway system and Wilson Station’s surrounding community. Taking the omnipresent steel handrail tube, Outside the Lines transforms this simple material into an interactive sculpture and wayfinding device. The installations are formed from durable, powder-coated steel tubes mounted to various surfaces throughout the site. In addition to the enhancement and animation of the new work, the piece provides both amenity and wayfinding for Wilson Station. Complementing the physically interactive environment of Wilson Station through a similarly tactile artwork is an integral component of Outside the Lines.
Woodbine Station

Marmin Borins: Directions Intersections Connections

Directions Intersections Connections is a vibrant relief mural to be installed on the north-facing wall of the Woodbine Station Bus Platform. The mural refers to the covering of distance depicted as time and transport – fashioned with bright hues and graphic patterns. The artwork pursues the visual means by which a project can appear abstract and yet simultaneously offer a composite narrative. At over 1,000 square feet, the brightly coated metal panels of the mural express the motion and directional routes of transit, the intersections of communities and place, and the connections of site to both the present and the past.