With a piece of chalk in hand, I stared at the enormous canvas that stood before me. Even in an environment as lavish as the Eaton Centre, the large blackboard stood out, perhaps due to it spanning the height of the entire story and it being at least as wide as a medium-sized store. It was sprinkled with purposeful words and colourful drawings stylized with a touch of personal cadence from their creators. Near the top right corner, the words “Before I die…” were printed in fashionably large and bolded letters. One might wonder if conceivably it attracted this much attention, not because of its expansive size but rather what it represents. With that thought in mind, I lifted my hand to the blackboard and began putting down my own answer to the prompt.

I’m recalling this from June of 2022 while I was volunteering at the Luminato Festival. For those who aren’t familiar with Luminato, it’s a week-long festival of arts and ideas. They often host interactive exhibitions such as this display of public art which has quickly become one of my personal favourites. I do not remember exactly what I wrote that day in June of 2022. However, I can assure you that this experience along with the 2023 edition where the prompt was “Belong is…” have stuck with me and have set the foundation for satisfying some of my own enigmatic curiosities.

As the summer of 2023 approached, I was actively looking for a wild, wild adventure—a wacky project to dedicate the vast majority of my time towards. Too ambitious? Maybe. Nonetheless, I needed some way to quench my addiction to crazy ideas, most of which were about as likely to come to fruition as the ‘23-’24 Detroit Pistons winning the NBA championship(Sorry Pistons fans but if it does work out, this will age like fine wine).

Ideas didn’t grow on trees however. Still yet, over a couple nights of bland thoughts, one finally struck.

I wondered—if you had the chance to make a mark, write or draw whatever you wanted on a blank canvas made for exactly that purpose—what would you draw, or write or mark? Without a limit to your imagination, what would you conjure up?

I had long mulled this proposition in my head but its breadth had always held me back from pursuing this thought further. Tossing it through my brain a couple more times teetered me to reconsider. Would you draw? What would you draw? Why? As much as I understood that a narrower subject line would’ve yielded more proper analysis, the echo of these simple yet profound questions proved impossible to resist.

I had to find out.

Scratch that.

We had to find out.

Evidently, I wasn’t alone in pondering upon this question. Frankly, if I were, this project would have been dead in the water from the get go (I may have outlandish ideas but never the means to realize them). Luckily, when I approached my friends William and Shu Yang about this conundrum, they were immediately supportive and eager to bring this to life, strutting up my confidence in the success of this project.

“That’s sounds great Corey, let’s figure out a day where we’re all free so we can make this work” - Shu Yang

“MEGA W IM DOWN” - William

My friends were visibly excited. And so was I.

All we needed to do now was make it happen. After a day and a half of purchasing materials, tireless effort and goofing around with the Password Game (shhh), there it was…

A blank canvas and no rules. Constructed from the finest cardboard, dusty chair legs to prevent bending and a couple long sticks I found in my yard to keep it upright. A thin layer of paper draped across to enhance the marker to paper experience. To go along with it, a rectangular piece of poster board plastered with the words DRAW ANYTHING in big, bold letters. You can reach out to me if you would like to see the construction process.

On the 17th of August 2023, the three of us took our canvas and poster to downtown Toronto and invited the nice folks passing by to treat themselves with what essentially became a free drawing session.

The results struck us in awe…but not in the way you expect.

Hold on. Rewind a bit. There’s just a tiny piece of context I must add. You see, the drive behind this project was scientific inquiry. This was meant to be a social experiment. For a while leading up to the project, I’ve found social science to be quite intriguing. I occasionally think about why my mind was wired the way it was. The natural follow up is to extend that question to society as a whole. The thought captivated and mesmerized me. And of course, there is no debut into social science better than running a social experiment yourself. So there was my focus going into this adventure. It would always be on what could be observed. Why did this person draw this figure? What were the motivations behind it? What was the thought process?

When we finally decided to call it a day after hours in the blazing sun and crowded streets, it’s safe to say that I wasn’t one bit disappointed with the observable results. Not one bit. Compared to our initial hypothesis of 30 items, the fact that our canvas was completely covered with barely any room to spare blew past our wildest dreams.

All the flags sewn onto our canvas, representing the backgrounds of the people of this city and what that heritage means to them. The plethora of cute cats, funky fish and cynical crew members(Among Us reference) are each like a piece of its artists’ mind. Some items can only be described as artistic masterpieces. One such example is the intricately constructed, carefully drawn skeleton-like character with a neat mohawk holding a chewed up bone. I don’t know where it’s from but that’s definitely a highlight. Others were more quickly put together but did not sacrifice any thoughtfulness. Everyone appreciates a good old heart sketch or a happy face. No shortage of those were splattered all over the canvas. Oh and that’s not even mentioning all the kind and positive messages left on the page. The “your cool”s and “Have A Great Day!”s. Props to whomever wrote that. Even a small positive message can brighten up those who read it. There were sunflowers, suns, “M Go Blue!”(I love UMich too), clovers, puppies, foxes, messages of love, figurines and so much more. There’s even a “Do you have rizz?”. You physically cannot stop chuckling after reading that. The sheer variety of art pieces, spread across the entire canvas was truly fascinating. Anything you can name, you bet, you can find it on the page.

It was all we could ask for and certainly merits a full-blown analysis. With every drawing on the canvas, with every pencil streak and every dot tacked on, there is a story behind it. One that is worth looking at, one that is worth understanding. Whenever I stroll in the woods, the sound of birds chirping echoes in the background. What I’ve long failed to realize is that every holler and tune is different. A different message, a different meaning. I can’t help but think it’s that way with each and every one of us as well. One day, I hope that we take the time and figure out why? Why did this person choose to tell this story, sing this song or sketch this drawing? Studying not one of which thought was given to but one that is made spontaneously. The psychology of spontaneity.

In the meantime, I would like to share what I found surprised me the most. Having just left the area where we were stationed, carrying the canvas all folded up after an eventful but tiresome day, I caught sight of a participant in our activity. He slipped me a Pokemon card, as if it were a token of appreciation. I smiled at my friends. I joked about how we were getting compensation for this. Then it crossed my mind. Did people actually like what we were doing?

In fact, the signs were there throughout the day, that maybe it was more than just a social experiment.

There was this woman who seemed to take it to her liking that she could draw anything she wanted.

(Obviously not the exact words she said but it is the gist of it)

“Anything???”, She said. “What if I draw —”. For legal reasons, I’m going to cut it right there. She proceeded to not draw what she said. Phew. In her own words, she decided to keep it “PG” to our relief. She was enjoying it.

Not everyone wanted to be a part of our activity but among those who did, many showed a keen interest and curiosity to what we were doing. As the day went on, we received various questions. Some wondered whether it was a school project? Some wondered how the idea came about? I took it as a hint that perhaps they were into it as they decided that it was worth their time to put something on after approaching us with their questions.

I remember groups of teenagers giggling together as they drew on the corners of the canvas. Children with their eyes wide and huge smiles hanging from their faces as they reached up to make their mark. Their parents took out their phones to snap photos and catch the moment. During peak hours, the atmosphere was invigorating and lively as if it was some type of social memorabilia to remember the graduating class. People were gathered all around it, chatting and cackling.

I never imagined what we witnessed was how the day would unfold even if I had any expectations to begin with. Perhaps it was only so shocking because I was so consumed with the content on the canvas that I never gave much thought to the people behind it. Anyhow, it caught me off guard but now that I think of it, maybe I shouldn’t have been so surprised.

Every once in a while, I wonder if any of the participants still think about or remember anything about their experience that day. Whatever transpired beforehand, whether it was a good day or a bad day and then seeing us with a large canvas inviting them to draw anything they would like. I’d imagine that our little project served as an amusing deviation from their otherwise normal day. It was something interesting. Something different. I can only wonder if that piques our curious nature and temporarily allows us to just be in the moment, seeing much more than we realize on a daily basis. When you think about it that way, it’s easy to understand why it was so enthralling.

Our world feels more polarized than ever right now. War is still ravaging in many places around the world while politicians continue to duel with seemingly no common ground. While it may not be on your mind every single day, do you ever feel that unease discretely trickling down and that cold tingly feeling boiling your insides? When that happens, I tend to take a trip back to that day just to remind myself about the drawings peppered onto the canvas and the smiles lit upon each participant’s face. It gives me hope.

NOTE FROM AUTHOR: As an editorial writer, my original intent was to have this conceived as a traditional editorial article. By now, you may have noticed that what started as a constructive argument has shifted to become a memoir of sorts, documenting a personal experience. However, as I alluded to in the article itself, my perspective and conception of this piece has evolved. As a result, I believe the best way to get the message across was through a personal narrative. At the end of the day, an editorial article is one that presents an opinion on a topic. This article conforms within that mold. Whether you agree or not, I hope that you, dear reader, still find this piece as informational and uplifting.