Does Toronto represent the world? Cosmopolis Toronto aims to find out
Colin Boyd Shafer is the photographer behind Cosmopolis Toronto, a project that is aiming to photograph a Torontonian from every country in the world. He’s been working on it for almost nine months and has most of the countries.
I heard about the project thanks to a tweet from the Windsor Arms. I took a look at it and immediately contacted Shafer to apply for Trinidad and Tobago.
The project has been exhibited in the Toronto Centre for the Arts and is now at Rsquared Cafe. He also hopes to take the exhibit on tour both in and out of Canada and turn it into a coffee book.
The project, which wraps up on May 15th, has taught Shafer many things, some of which he shared with me earlier this year.
You’ve taken almost 130 (Update: he now has almost 190) photos of people from around the world. Were you surprised at the ease or difficulty of finding people from certain countries?
A little bit of both. I guess the fact that I managed to photograph over 115 people in two months indicates that it wasn’t that difficult. However, I still don’t have a participant born in Kenya or Algeria – two examples of countries I didn’t think would be difficult to find someone from in the beginning.
Clearly given the
long list of remaining countries this task ahead of me will not be easy.
Either way, I don’t think there would be a city on earth more suited to such a quest.
Shafer is looking for people from these countries.
How much of your subjects now come from word of mouth or from your media coverage? Have you found it easier to find people?
In the beginning it was word of mouth, then as time went on the media coverage helped a lot.
I definitely think the fact that the project has a following and a solid base makes it more appealing to join. I can’t thank the first participants enough for trusting me!
Have you received any negative feedback for your project? Or, what has been the most frustrating thing about doing this project?
Obviously some people view the world through a very short-term lens, often forgetting that they too are the product of migration, just maybe less recent. So there has been a very few people critical of such a project.
Still, the feedback has been 99.9 per cent positive and all in all I have been surprised by the overall support from newcomers all the way to many-generations-back-Canadians.
What has been the most common response to why people want to be part of the project or if they refuse, what reasons do they give?
For many people it is chance to tell “their story”. Even with their closest friends in a normal Toronto setting, they may never dig that deep and share this intimate past. It can be a sort of unveiling in a way. Other people feel like it is a moment where they are truly part of this community… an important moment in them becoming Torontonian or even Canadian.
Some people are obviously hesitant as it is very personal, and revealing… even making them face past memories they may have avoided confronting. I understand and respect this trying to accommodate the needs of each person I photograph.
If you’re from one of the countries still on Shafer’s list, you
can apply here.
You can follow Cosmopolis Toronto:
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