Typha

Location: Leslie Street at Lakeshore

Date photo taken: 26 February 2021

Typhus is a relatively new sculpture, installed in December 2020. Designed by artist Dean Baldwin with fabrication work and installation by Lafontaine Iron Werks, it stands at the edge of the Leslie Spit. I love everything about this piece. It's rough and wild and beautiful and cattails are a perfect tie to nearby Tommy Thompson Park, an area described as an accidental wilderness and now designated as an Environmentally Significant Area. There's more to it than that though. With the spit and park looking the way it does now, it's easy to forget that it is in fact man-made, the result of years of dumping construction materials and material dredged from the harbour. If you wander the beaches, you're likely to glimpse bits of rusted out rebar and other bits of scrap. Some people have created mini sculptures from them, and this inspired Baldwin. If you look closely, you'll notice that threaded throughout the sculpture are smoothed bits of brick and even some marine floats. Finally, many of the upright stalks you see are reclaimed track rails from Toronto's streetcar system, It's both an example of creative re-use and a nod to the Leslie Barns just next door.