Finding Toronto's G-Spot, Gentrification in the creative city A movie by Katja Diallo (concept, interviews, images) and Jan Kryszons (animation, editing), Keulen 2007 After stakeholders expressed their concern about a decline in the city's appearance, the City Council directed on an aggressive program to restore Toronto's image. It looks as though the city suffers of a phobic fear of dirt. On the other hand gentrification has entered the top-10 of most sexy urban topics in the public discourse of Toronto. This animation/ documentary 'Finding Toronto's G-Spot', is a compilation of a selection interviews I had with several Torontonians about the backdrops of the urban ideology of the creative city; gentrification, the privatization of public space and the condo boom in a global, and more specific, in a Canadian perspective. Along with the interviews the movie shows numerous images I took of homeless people, by-laws, real-estate advertisements and city garbage. 'Finding Toronto's G-Spot' is a result of my project 'Urban Rubbish Revaluation' which questions the elimination of all rubbish in urban landscapes of cities directing towards a so-called 'creative city'. I referred to urban rubbish in terms of posters, graffiti, subversive non-places, beggars, pigeons and other undesirable urban defaults. In each interview I asked people to read and comment on a quote of the official Clean and Beautification City Program. Finding Toronto's G-Spot includes talks with: Roger Keil is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University, Toronto. He has published extensively on urban politics particularly in world cities, on urban ecological issues and environmental politics. His current research is on urban governance restructuring, amalgation and secession in Los Angeles and Toronto. In Finding Toronto's G-Spot Roger points to the social gaps that occur in the creative city ideology. Duncan Walker is a member of the activist group, the City Beautification Ensemble Toronto that strives to change the notable effects of the common grey in the urban landscape on the citizens. The group paints public objects in public space and initiates discussions with the city council and the users of the streets. Ute Lehrer's mayor research project is "Urban Images, public space and the growth of private interests in Toronto." She is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University, Toronto. Talking about the G-Spot of Toronto' she introduces her theory on the condo-boom and how reversed suburbanisation is influencing the economical restructuring of urban life and the public space. Ute is also an observer of the gentrification process that is going on along Queen West. John Honderich, the well-known former publisher of the newspaper 'Toronto Star', belongs to the cultural elite of the city. In 2006 Honderich was appointed as Special Advisor on the future of the greater Toronto area and Creative Cities. In Toronto's G-Spot we see him orating during the congress Building Creative Communities. Misha Glouberman works and lives in the gallery district on Queen Street West. He is concerned about the interests of residents are represented in his city and how neighbourhoods develop. He is the founding member of the Queens/ Beaconsfield Residents Association. Luis Jacob and Amos Latteier, both visual artists, believe that, like humans who live outdoors in the city, pigeons are unfairly judged. Like real-estaters they promoted a proposal for a luxury condo tower for the birds. The tower was to be built on the site where Tent-City (an organic grown area for homeless people under the Gardiner Expressway) had just aggressively been cleaned out by the real-estate developer. Urban Rubbish Revaluation was made possible with the help of Artscape Toronto and the Centre of Fine Arts Dordrecht. >> Gerealiseerd