Art gallery to cross-promote with Italian restaurant

Located at 80 Gerrard St. E, Gallery Arcturus has been in business for about ten years, but the venue is not as popular as you may expect. Seeing between 20 and 50 people weekly, the gallery is undertaking new advertising initiatives to give its paintings, sculptures and multi-media art a bigger audience.

Gallery Arcturus art is made by artists in-house (Kimberly Ivany)

“We’d love to have double the amount [of people] we get,” says Eron Boyd, the gallery’s space manager. “It’s a public gallery and that’s the whole purpose. We always have to try and push to get people to come in.”

The gallery is currently planning a dual advertisement with Pasta Papa, an Italian restaurant situated directly on its east side. While neither place knows exactly what the partnership will entail, the goal is to make their part of the neighbourhood more attractive to Torontonians and tourists alike.

Pasta Papa is located right next to the gallery (Kimberly Ivany)

“We don’t know which direction it’s going,” says Chef Hanri inside Pasta Papa of the partnership. “It’s mostly for tourists in hotels around the area to try to get them here to eat food and go next door.”

Edward Drass is a writer for Metro newspaper and a spokesperson for Gallery Arcturus. He says the gallery’s location is “a little bit of a mind block,” even for Ryerson students on campus a mere 50 steps away.

“Thousands of people walk up and down the street who don’t necessarily notice the building,” he said.

The entrance to Gallery Arcturus (Kimberly Ivany)

For Drass, the best way to advertise is to actually talk to people – something that he says will be possible through the collaborative promotion with the restaurant.

“For now, I think the main idea is having people come down and make a connection,” he said. “It has to be about old-fashioned relationships.”

So will modern art mixed with good eats and conversations prove to be a successful recipe for popularity?

“It’s no guarantee,” said Drass. “It’s something we’ve never tried before, but it’s an interesting twist.”