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Turtle Pond

Turtle Pond

FASTWÜRMS
Founded 1979

Turtle Pond
  • Brass dividers & colour terrazzo
  • 1997
  • 1,300 m²
  • 223 Bremner Boulevard, MTCC South Building, Toronto

About the artwork

This work is a unique terrazzo floor design integrated into the entrance and registration level floors of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The narrative design of turtle geometry, leopard frog and raven iconography, is delineated in both floors with 14,000 sq ft of brass dividers and colour terrazzo. The key elements of the work aim to create something that is visually striking for the entrance by day and night. Furthermore, there is a strong desired to be site responsible, integrating iconography and promote cohesive cultural narratives.

About the artist

FASTWÜRMS is an artist collective based out of Toronto and Creemore. Formed in 1979, the collective was originally comprised of three members: Kim Kozzi (Kim Kozolanka from Ottawa), Dai Skuse (David Skuse from England), and Napo B. (Napoleon Brousseau from Ottawa), who met while employed as security guards at the National Gallery of Canada. Upon moving to New York City in the 1980s, Napo B. formally left the collective in 1991. Kozzi and Skuse continue to produce artworks under the FASTWÜRMS name. The collective’s multidisciplinary practice takes on many forms including video, immersive installations, performance and public art, to explore the themes of identity, humour, magic and social exchange. FASTWÜRMS strongly identifies with fringe communities and sub-cultures, often employing punk aesthetics and witchcraft as tools to examine identity politics and social interaction. The collective also celebrates their working class background, crediting much of their “determined DIY sensibility” to the untrained artists they have learned from. Currently living and creating from their home in rural Ontario, FASTWÜRMS also spend their time teaching studio art at the University of Guelph. Their work has been exhibited extensively both in North America and internationally at venues such as the Power Plant (Toronto), the Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver), the Seoul Museum of Art (Korea), and the 2006 São Paulo Biennial (Brazil).

Fun facts

  • The name FASTWÜRMS comes from a technique of Super 8 film editing that collective member Kim first created in 1979. This fast intercut "punk" style of assembly was built physically, using clothesline and pegs to hang "wurms", or verious lengths of short film, by their heads and tails.

Engagement questions

  • Does this work impact how you feel about the space around it?