Short Takes : Lennon Art Returns to Toronto

Drawings the late John Lennon made while he and Yoko Ono brought their peace protest to Canada are returning to the city for an exhibition.

The one-month show at the Animation Gallery Ltd., which opens Nov. 9, includes the simple but sexually explicit line drawings from the Bag One Suite in a hotel where they camped in a protest of the bad things in the world.

Britain’s Scotland Yard confiscated the drawings in 1970 for being pornographic.

“And now we’re in an age where Jesse Helms is trying to suppress all kinds of artwork, so nothing’s really changed,” says Ono, referring to the U.S. senator who blocked federal arts grants for an exhibit of photos by Robert Mapplethorpe.

“I don’t know what politicians think (about Lennon’s art), but I know ordinary people are far more sophisticated and accepting of it,” she said.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the rock superstar’s birth and the 10th anniversary of his death. He was gunned down in New York City on Dec. 8, 1980.