Alleyway Gallery

Current Exhibition

Streetcar Stop - 2025

By Gustavo jabbaz
November 2025 - April 2026
Opening Reception Sunday November 2nd 2025 2-5 PM

The streetcar is my favourite mode of public transportation in Toronto. There’s something special about gliding through the city in a vehicle that sits high on the road, with no side-to-side movement, and generous windows framing urban life. Though they are slow, easily blocked, and often infuriate drivers, they persist.

Toronto’s streetcar system has operated continuously since 1861, initially as horse-drawn carriages, and has been electric since 1892. Managed by the Toronto Transit Commission since 1921, it is now the most extensive streetcar system on the American Continent and one of the few that has never been shut down or entirely replaced.

Today, the entire active fleet consists of Flexity Outlook low-floor articulated vehicles, fully accessible and wheelchair-friendly. The total planned fleet size is to reach 264 cars by 2025. In 2024, nearly 35 million passengers rode streetcars, which travelled over 10.4 million kilometres. While the subway remains the fastest and most efficient mode overall, and the bus offers the widest coverage, streetcars are most effective downtown, where they serve as moving observation decks for city life.

In my work, I celebrate this flawed, enduring system—not for its speed, but for its character. The streetcar is a symbol of continuity, resistance to erasure, and the quiet beauty of transit that insists on taking its time.

Gustavo Jabbaz is a Photography-based Visual Artist and passionate urban photographer whose work explores the dynamic energy of city life. His artistic journey began early, as he taught himself the intricacies of developing and printing black-and-white photographs. In 1998, he transitioned into the digital era with his first camera and has since remained committed to this medium, embracing its potential to transform his creative vision.

As an emerging artist, Gustavo designs digital collages that blend photographs of urban scenes and pedestrians. His process involves capturing the visual allure of specific locations or structures, which he amplifies to create immersive and captivating artwork that dominates the viewer’s vision. Through his work, Gustavo seeks to reveal the extraordinary within the ordinary, offering a fresh perspective on the familiar.

Gustavo’s work has been showcased in several exhibitions, including People Looking at Art at Alleyway Gallery during the CONTACT Photography Festival in 2024 and Stilled Moments and Looking for Sky at Gallery Arcturus, curated by Deborah Harris for the CONTACT Photography Festival in 2023. His other exhibitions include Blue at Gallery 44 in 2023, SNAP for ACT Photo Contest in 2024, and the Annual Juried Shows of Fine Arts at the Art Gallery of Mississauga in 2020 and 2024.

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