Art Department was an inspiring pop-up exhibition that rose from the ashes of the 1980’s recession and featured a variety of work by over 20 artists. Space was cheap or free, galleries were nominal and downtown artists were flourishing. Anything was possible.
When the Polish National Union and Newspaper closed its doors at 1087 Queen Street west, the time of The Great Hall had begun. I secured the space in exchange for cleaning up the grease from the printing presses and we mounted an exhibition in the entire ground floor and windows. It brought together artists from the Liberty Street warehouse that runs between Atlantic and Jefferson, long before there was a ‘village’ and mushroomed from there. It was the first project I had initiated – innocent in conception yet ambitious in scope. After a raucous opening party the exhibition ran for a few weeks in October 1985.We have some documentation of the installations but any written documents have been lost. That includes the list of participating artists that I hope we will be able to recover someday.

-Catherine Beaudette, Organizer