OCAD University

link title

Headline text

The Ontario College of Art & Design showing the Sharp Centre for Design, below it is the original school.

The Entrance to the Ontario College of Art & Design during the night

Inside a class in 1931

The Ontario College of Art & Design is Canada's largest and oldest university for art and design. It is located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. With a student body of approximately 3,500, the school is small, with a student/faculty ratio of 20:1.

Founded in 1876 by the Ontario Society of Artists, the Ontario College of Art & Design was originally known as the Ontario School of Art. In 1912, after various name changes, the school finally adopted the name Ontario College of Art. The school retained this name for another eighty-four years before changing to its present incarnation. The change was made in recognition of the integral role design plays in a visual art education.

Throughout its history, the OCAD community has been home to many of Canada's premiere artists and designers, including Arthur Lismer, Floria Sigismondi, and Michael Snow

The school has often found itself at the centre of Toronto's cultural and artistic nexus. In 1969-70, during his brief period of tenure, the President, Roy Ascott, radically challenged the pedagogy and curriculum structure of the College. William Gibson's years dreamed up cyberspace. Sound and video artist David Rokeby's Very Nervouse System, Unincumbered Reality. At the turn of the 1980s, OCAD was a major participant in the Queen Street West scene. A new generation of artists such as General Idea, Jeremiah Chechik and Isobel Harry helped transform the run-down neighbourhood into a "Toronto's Soho". The scene evolved its own version of punk/new wave, featuring acts such as Parachute Club, Molly Johnson, and alumni Martha and the Muffins and Mary Margaret O'Hara.

In the nineties, OCAD saw an explosion of creative talent in its design faculty. Its award-winning student periodical, White Space, drew city-wide attention.

OCAD offers programs leading to either a BFA (Bachelor of Fine Arts) or a BDes (Bachelor of Design); the school's majors include Drawing and Painting, Sculpture and Installation, Integrated Media, Industrial Design, Graphic Design and Advertising. Noted faculty have included Arthur Lismer, J.E.H. MacDonald, Jock Macdonald, Gordon Rainer, Colette Whiten, Lisa Steele, Ian Carr-Harris, Robin Collyer, Johanna Householder, Richard Fung, Carl Dair and Allan Fleming.

The school is located on McCaul Street beside the Art Gallery of Ontario. In 2004 work was completed on a new expansion. The "Sharp Centre for Design", designed by architect Will Alsop, of Alsop Architects, in a joint venture with Toronto-based Robbie/Young + Wright Architects Inc., has been called the "floating shoebox" or "tabletop". It consists of a box four storeys off the ground supported by a series of multi-coloured pillars at different angles. The building has received numerous awards, including the first-ever Royal Institute of British Architects Worldwide Award, the award of excellence in the 'Building in Context' category at the Toronto Architecture and Urban Design Awards, and was deemed the most outstanding technical project overall in the 2005 Canadian Consulting Engineering Awards. The College Street building, which was part of the campus until 1997, was once a Toronto Police station house.

External links

• Ontario College of Art & Design