Apart from Stephen Andrews's mosaic, I can't think of anything to recommend this building from an artistic point of view.
Incidentally, I noticed that they were installing new lights today above York Wilson's five mosaic panels ( 1965 ) on the outside of the Bell Canada building just along the street at 76 Adelaide West:
A little about the work:
More than two decades later, York received a commission for a mural at the new Bell Telephone building on Adelaide Street in Toronto. York completed this project and the Port Arthur General Hospital murals during the eighteen month period separating our return from Paris in early 1964 and our departure for a world-round trip in late 1965.
York was thrilled at the prospect of a mosaic mural for Bell. He had been interested in mosaics ever since we stopped at Ravenna while en route from Venice to Rome in the autumn of 1957. York had discussed mosaics with architect Ronald Dick and Franklin Arbuckle when they visited us in Paris in late 1963. When the building was contracted to Marani, Routhwaite and Dick architectural firm, Ron Dick recalled that Paris conversation and contacted York. In a letter of April 25, 1964 to Dick, York outlined his theme and declared the mosaic medium desirable “in that it would introduce colour in an unusual way, where it would have value both as decoration and as identification.â€
The mural was to take the form of five vertical panels, each 20’ by 5’, installed on the building’s external façade. The mural’s title was Communications. Each panel expressed a different of the theme: written, drawn, musical, verbal and electronic. Within the panels are many symbols, including Greek, Moabite, and Etruscan letter forms, early Spanish cave paintings, bars of music, abstracted human faces, and a satellite in action
To execute the Bell mural, York contracted the services of Alex Von Svoboda of Toronto’s Conn-Arts Studio, a firm specializing in mosaics, murals, designs and sculptures for ecclesiastical and commercial projects. York designed the mural, selected the material and Conn-Arts did the installation. At the Conn-Arts studio, York enlarged his sketches onto heavy brown paper later marked like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. The tesserae were glued face down onto the paper in their final design; when the tesserae were embedded in cement, the brown paper was removed and the panels were installed on the building. Throughout the process, York enjoyed an excellent rapport with Alex and was pleased with the finished mural, installed in 1965.
In “Wilson Rings Bell with Mosaics,†published in the Globe and Mail (June 12, 1965) shortly before the mural’s installation, Kay KritzWeiser discussed the project’ genesis and execution, and noted that York had been careful to mimic the uneven surfaces of early mosaics, “so that the play of light and shadow during day and night will become a continuous wonder. Rain will sluice away soot. Sun will catch the glitter of gold leaf impregnated between layers of glass.â€
These beautiful colour murals, surrounded by white marble, are best appreciated when viewed up close. Unfortunately, they are placed so high that one cannot appreciate them fully, and the mosaics are no longer lit at night. Bell’s brochure, which featured a colour reproduction of the finished mural, is no longer available. York made a small sample mosaic section which the AIO toured to schools and small towns in Ontario in 1965. At that time, numerous buildings in Toronto featured mural decorations. As an article in the Toronto Daily Star (August 9, 1965) queried, “What’s a Business Without a Mural?†York’s works for Imperial Oil, the O’Keefe Centre and Bell are mentioned therein.
Reference:
1. Lela M. Wilson. Edited by Sandra Dyck (1997). York Wilson: His Life and Work, 1907-1984. Carleton University Press.
pp171-172
