I feel incredibly lucky to have led a photography workshop inside the historic Horse Palace at Exhibition Place in Toronto. We had an amazing lineup of Elinchrom gear to work with for the day from the Elinchrom 3s and 5s to the Rotalux Go with grid, the 100 cm Rotalux Deep Octa with grid, the Deep White Umbrella, and the Rotalux Beauty Dish. We powered the entire 3-plus-hour workshop using the battery-powered Elinchrom Fives and Threes, and even after eight photographers rotated through each lighting setup, the batteries were still above 50% power and that’s impressive after that much work. I personally needed a rest and an espresso before loading out at the end of the day .
The Horse Palace, built for the 1931 CNE and Winter Fair, is one of Toronto’s most remarkable Art Deco landmarks. Designed by City Architect James John Woolnough, it officially opened on August 15, 1931. In its early years, the building even included a dedicated horse hospital with its own entrance. The Horse Palace measures an impressive 320 × 550 feet and offers more than 326,000 square feet of space with 1,200 stalls across two floors. The Horse Palace is a dream location for photographers and I was so excited to create in this space. Its concrete floors, planked stall interiors, and expansive layout create a dynamic environment for exploring lighting, composition, and using architectural elements in storytelling. The building’s strong horizontal and vertical planes, cubist forms, stall layout, and intricate metalwork are all classic signatures of Art Deco design and are what make this building such a fun place to photograph.
We’re truly thrilled to have instructed this this workshop in such an iconic and historically rich space, and we hope all the participants enjoy every minute of creating here today. I know it was a very cool location checked off my bucket list of awesome spaces I have always wanted to shoot in and explore. Seeing a solder’s initials carved in a stairwell while shooting and remembering that during the Second World War (specifically from 1939 onward), the Exhibition Place grounds, known as Exhibition Camp, were used by the Canadian Armed Forces. The Horse Palace was used as a barracks and temporary sleeping quarters for various military departments, including the 48th Highlanders and the Toronto Scottish battalions, before they were deployed overseas.
A heartfelt thank you to Exhibition Place for making this incredible workshop possible, to Alyssa McCabe for modelling, to Adriana Fulop (www.adriana-fulop.com) for the beautiful outfits and styling, and to Reanna Niceforo for assisting throughout the day.
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About Phil Sutherland and WTPG
Phil Sutherland is the founder and director of WTPG and has been organizing lighting workshops and photography workshops in the GTA for 15 years. He is the owner of Revprint Studio 205 (www.revprint.com) – Toronto’s premier facilitated rental Photography studio and a professional commercial photographer for 25 years.
A self-described “lighting nut”, he has produced public Light Art for the Amsterdam Light Festival and teaches photography internationally.
The West Toronto Photography Group is a not-for-profit arts group created in 2011 to help artists access photography and digital arts studio spaces, workshops and to help the general community through arts and fundraising.
If you enjoy photography and are looking to shoot in studio and on location and share your enthusiasm with our community of artists of all levels. We offer our workshops at our cost to allow everyone to participate in our events, our professional instructors are sharing their time and expertise to help inspire and contribute back to the community. We hire local and international talent to work with our group (models and MUA / hair stylists).
Please come join us for a workshop! We look forward to shooting and sharing with you!
Come set your creativity free! Photography Workshops | West Toronto Photography Group | Toronto (wtpg.ngo)
