Hey I’m Geoff and I’m a Torontonian. I moved here into this fine loft on Adelaide which is a centre of culture and art in Toronto about 5 years ago. I’ve been producing video out of this loft for that whole time and have been really lucky to have been surrounded by amazing, talented musicians, photographers, artists of all types really in this building ever since I moved in 5 years ago. But here we are 5 years later and it’s time for a change so I will be taking myself and my dog over to Brighton in the UK, the south coast of England, living by the sea, another city full of artists, musicians, filmmakers and all the most creative people in England, so I’m very excited for the new opportunity that’s coming ahead. But I will always love Toronto and I will be back. I love Toronto more than pretty much anywhere that I’ve visited in the world, the best food and certainly the best culture that one could experience certainly within North America and probably within the world. I’m Geoff and I’m a Torontonian.
-Thank you Geoff. Do you think you’re going to have the same context in the UK?
-I don’t know that the same infrastructure exists in the UK. One wouldn’t be able to find a place like this in the UK so I will do everything that I can to work with local artists, local musicians, local filmmakers in order to continue to create video but I think it will be in a different context in a different kind of space.
-What do you think will happen to this place when you get back?
-Truthfully places like this are becoming fewer and fewer. They’re getting torn down and condos being built on top of them, the same thing is happening here. It’s going to be a sad thing but there is no doubt that this place will become a condo and artists will be forced to move to other places in the city.
-How do you feel about it?
-Frankly I don’t feel too great about it. It’s a real bummer when a city can’t necessarily see the value of a place like this. It’s really the artist community that gets to see the value because you’re on the inside. Politicians and the people who are really in charge of how infrastructure is laid out in our city don’t know about what’s happening in these kinds of places so it sad. I don’t feel great about it but you have to accept the realities that we live with and artists are very flexible people.
-Thank you very much Geoff. Good luck in the UK!
