Brampton's Best Kept Secret?

Brampton has a lot of “best kept secrets” and I'm not sure if it works out as well as it should. A woman asked me at the Street Festival last week if there were any local galleries to take her niece to. She asked me if! A little pain went through my heart because she was going to head down to the Royal Ontario Museum or the Art Gallery of Ontario.

There are at least three galleries I could list off the top of my head running around in Brampton. Immediately the Peel Heritage Complex sprang to mind. Only because that's one of the first cultural spaces I remember visiting in my life. The Complex is a gallery, museum and archives with history framing and supporting it all since the public building is a former jail house. If you're not into history, the arts or archaeology, visit the Complex simply because of its architecture. I don't think I've seen buildings with this thick, heavy stone and how that stone is used in the building creates new spaces out of the old.

I was lucky enough yesterday to be led on a tour by one Diane Allengame, the current curator of the triple threat complex, to learn about changes and tidbits of Complex information. The most surprising face to me was that Complex is currently showing .03 % of their gallery collection and 1% of their museum collection. For those not in the know most museums usually present 10 % of their collections at a time allowing for material they can cycle and freshen displays with. Thankfully, the Complex is pursuing a much-needed expansion for more display and storage space. It will be closing its door sometime in the future in order to phase into this. Hopefully, I'll remember to remind everyone to pop in before they well, can't for a bit.

Another thing the expansion is looking to do is make the side of the complex that faces Gage Park a little more inviting, inclusive. Who can't enjoy that? No one. :)

The thing I liked about the tour was midpoint when I got to hear bursts of kids acting in the Museum from the Complex's summer program. There are young artists running amuck around this city of ours. I just gotta find 'em.

Peel Heritage Complex
9 Wellington Street East
Brampton, Ontario L6W 1Y1
Phone: 905-791-4055 Fax: 905-451-4931

Other galleries you can enjoy around town are:

Visual Arts Brampton
1 Bartley Bull Parkway, Suite 10
Brampton ON L6W 3T7
Phone: (905) 453-9142
E-mail: visualartsbrampton@gmail.com

and

Beaux Arts Brampton (which is just down the street from the Heritage Complex in Downtown Brampton)
70-74 Main Street North
Brampton, ON L6V 1N7
Tel: (905) 454-5677
Toll Free: 1-866-339-7779
Email: beauxart1@bellnet.ca

Last but not least there are a couple of Visual Arts groups you can check with that I haven't listed here but are on our website at: http://www.artsbrampton.ca/directory.htm

All of the galleries connect to the youth in different ways, whether through tours, lessons or courses. Check 'em out.

Have you ever been to the Peel Heritage Complex or any of our little galleries around town? What did you love? Do you want to go? Make plans!

Picture used with permission of Diane Allengame.

Currently listening to Hawsley Workman - Silent Night; Blue October - She's My Ride Home; Balkan Beat Box – Balcasio; Ella Fitzgerald's – A Night in Tunisa