Lake Ontario | Mama Cormier

…Col. Sam Smith Park is mostly made from landfill

This beautiful naturalized park in Toronto (south Etobicoke) is a gem in the neighbourhood. I remember years ago in the 1980s when dump trucks were lined up to unload their bins of landfill into Lake Ontario to expand the park. As a result an artificial harbour (now home to the Lakeshore Yacht Club) was created. It is skirted by grasslands punctuated by trees and set within the rocky shoreline. The lake-fill area also contains a wetlands habitat with wildlife-viewing platforms, while elsewhere among the tree-lined paths and lawns are playgrounds, pavilions, and a sport field.

This is one of the parks the Trish and I go to pick up litter. When you walk along the pathways you’d think the park is pretty clean but when you walk along the rocks you can see where people have partied and where the waves have deposited waste (mostly plastic) from the belly of the lake.

Here are some shots from the surface of the rocks and then what we’ve found between them.

….art installations on the rocky shores of Lake Ontario

Much of the beaches in Col. Sam Smith Park in Toronto are man made and made with landfill. Large of chunks of concrete and rebar and lovely old bricks line the shores of the park and the lake. Over the years people have lined up the bricks and laced them onto the rebar to create interesting sculptures. A couple of weeks ago during one of my walks along the beaches I noticed this interesting sculpture made with rebar and bricks.

Yesterday I took a similar path when I went for my daily walk and specifically looked for this same sculpture. As with most pieces of installation art in nature it was no longer there. I did see another piece that I think was mostly created by nature but it did seem to have some human involvement.

I was inspired to try my own hand at making a piece of sculpture with found objects. The rocks and bricks had such interesting colours and had been worn smooth from the crashing waves. In the second photo you can see that I used bits of wood, seashells, speckled stones and a piece of scrap metal. Can you see the face?