The University of Toronto Art Centre is such a wonderful city secret; I do enjoy viewing its collections in a usually private environment. Their recent Group of Seven exhibition was a poetic display of Canadian landscape, but I adore the Lillian Malcove Collection.

The Malcove collection houses fascinating examples of Byzantine icons, my secret passion. I bought a few during my last trip to Russian Fashion Week in Moscow and now I have something to confess: I’m an iconoholic. Some fashion friends don’t understand (though Lucian Matis’s graduation collection illustrated fashion-as-art perfectly), but art friends are enablers. The collection’s former curator, Dawn Cain, invited me to her presentation of the woman who made the collection possible, Lillian Malcove. Dawn and her curatorial assistant, Elisa Coish, are working on a biography project to find out more about Ms. Malcove and why she collected these works of art. I am so interested in the development of their research because I wonder if my own interest will turn into a full-blown addiction and if my condo will turn into it’s own medieval museum.

Some fashionistas don’t share my passion for art, which is why my column is so important. Art, music, fashion, and film all work together to make a Sophisticated City and it is my job to add sophistication into my reader’s lives.