Ursa Major & Taurus: Pavillion Fragments from the Starry Vault, 1983

A Prominent Canadian Corporate Collection

A colour print of the commissioned mural from the Toronto Stock Exchange. Ursa Major (Big Dipper) and Taurus (The Bull) constellations are depicted in General Idea's pop aesthetic, emphasizing the form of the animals highlighted with gold foil on an inky blue background. Interestingly, Ursa Major Mining and Taurus Minerals, a subsidiary of China Guandang Nuclear Power Corporation, were two major mining companies in Canada at the time of the commission and subsequent prints. While gold and other valuable minerals are trading as commodities on global stock exchanges, it has a history of affecting the value of subsequent currencies on the stock exchange. For Canada, with a history of gold and mineral mining—most recently the significant contribution to the global economy being the exportation of uranium—the figures in the print coupled with the gold metallic foil give a nod to Canada's role in the global economy appropriately situated in the nations main trading centre.