Gateways | Part 1

I'm Millie Chen and I worked with Warren Quigley on this piece called "Gateway" that is in two parts, one on the northbound streetcar platform and one on the southbound of the Spadina Line. This is a symbol - based on a symbol that is gateway in Chinese. So this was a perfect fit for the purpose of this particular spot because I was asked to create something that would signify Chinatown essentially, a marker for Chinatown. And so in discussion with Warren, this being a perfect symbol in terms of its meaning but also the fact that it is the same symbol that's used in Korean and in Japanese and also Pre-colonial Vietnamese. So that kind of Pan East Asian, I guess, sway that it has, or the recognizability of it was very appealing in terms of using it. It also lends itself well architecturally to being a gateway, albeit the orientation ideally would have crossed Spadina but it's not possible in terms of the traffic zoning

The formation of the sculptures is the character for Gateway. And the four creatures, they're not exactly animals, that are part of each of the two, contribute to that formation. So, they mold themselves to this symbol. And the four characters are: the Monkey King, the "Qlin", which is roughly translated as Unicorn, although it's not at all a unicorn but it's a hybridized animal in Chinese mythology as well, and then the Dragon and Phoenix which are probably the most recognizable for a western audience.

Want to hear more? Check out Part 2.

Runtime 00:02:03