Canada Treats Our Artists Better Than We Do: FriendsWithYou Gets Invited to Toronto

We have good news and bad. Miami artists FriendsWithYou were commissioned to art up a public park, create installations in high rises, and treated like art royalty. But it all happened thousands of miles away from the 305 in a completely different country called Canada. (It's not part of the...

By Amanda McCorquodale

July 8, 2010

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We have good news and bad. Miami artists FriendsWithYou were commissioned to art up a public park, create installations in high rises, and treated like art royalty. But it all happened thousands of miles away from the 305 in a completely different country called Canada. (It's not part of the U.S. We checked. )

Luminato is an annual ten-day arts festival where Toronto's stages,

streets, and public spaces are filled with theater, dance, music, and visual arts. For Luminato's Wish Come True Festival, FriendsWithYou artists Samuel Borkson and Arturo Sandoval III turned Toronto's Queen's Park into Rainbow City, a world of blow-up creatures and giant Malfi-esque beings in bright colors. FriendsWithYou's Wish Come True mascot, Rainbow King, was chosen as ambassador of Luminato and even opened the Canadian Stock Exchange.

Meanwhile, Miami continues to upchuck Britto sculptures on every

corner. How bout a cheerful FriendsWithYou installation in our own

Bayfront Park? As we sit on the lame Metromover or in traffic with

some of country's worst and angriest drivers, it might help us remember

why they call this place the Magic City.

Here's what Miami could have looked like:

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