GOULD STREET

Canadian content Prized photo collection moves from New York to Toronto

ON THE occasion of Canada’s sesquicentennial, the university celebrates a new gift promised to the Ryerson Image Centre (RIC): a cache of nearly 25,000 press photographs of Canadian news, events and personalities from the 20th century, drawn from The New York Times Photo Archive. Acquired by real estate entrepreneur Chris Bratty, and generously promised to the RIC, the collection repatriates Canadian cultural heritage and further establishes the RIC as a key destination for the study of significant archives of press photography.

With its origins in the newsrooms of the New York Times, the collection presents a revealing insight into the ways our national identity is constructed from the outside through photojournalistic practice. To be known as the Rudolph P. Bratty Family Collection, the donation will be introduced to the public in the RIC exhibition The Faraway Nearby, opening Sept. 13, 2017, and on display until Dec. 10.

The collection offers an expansive view of the diverse histories that have constituted Canadian life, from the point of view of the New York Times. It covers First Nations, people of colour and immigrant communities, and includes photographs of political events, major conflicts, prominent international figures on visits to Canada, iconic landscapes and, of course, hockey. Portraits in the exhibition include iconic figures such as Margaret Atwood, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Glenn Gould, Marshall McLuhan and Pierre Elliott Trudeau.