Why the wheel? The display's curator, himself an artist, chose it because of its universal application and its ancient history. The circle, though not the wheel of transportation, was known in every society that has left a record on this planet. Sanjit Sethi, an American who has acquired an international reputation for his work, is to be commended for having chosen this universal symbol to create a display that draws on the universal nature of Toronto. He said this: "The Museum is taking a risk by allowing individuals of varied and diverse backgrounds access to a venue usually reserved for what the museum or society has traditionally deemed legitimate creators." In other words, for allowing non-artists to take on the role of creator. He also noted that "The public participants' risk is in the deeply personal nature of the project . . . how much are they willing to reveal to a larger world?"

The participants do, indeed, reveal a great deal about themselves. One would not be surprised to hear that they, themselves, were surprised at what has sprung out of their imagination and from their fingers. The display's designer, an architect as well as an artist, created an environment for these works that equals the imaginative wheels wrought out of the minds of novice potters. Philip Beesley chose the entire museum as the space in which to display these wheels. Hence, a wonderful juxtaposing takes place of seeing works of modern minds openly displayed — without protective barriers— next to antique creations protectively encased behind glass. Some of the new works seem remarkably sympathetic to the creations of pre-Colombian artisans as if the fresh mind of the lay creator of the present drew on the same subconscious, instinctive sense for form that inhabited the unknown artisans of centuries, even millennia ago. Some works reveal the person's cultural heritage, others seem completely free of any association other than the visual repertoire we have all built up in daily life.

If there is any disappointment is this huge display spread over the museum's two floors, it is the film that accompanies it. While sitting there taking it in from beginning to end, I watched visitors, who stopped, fascinated by a few frames showing people working with clay, only to walk away as soon as the film changed over to long, very intimate, closely focused footage of individual creations, often so distorted they could not be identified. The film maker somehow got lost in his art and forgot about the viewer. Film, no matter what kind, is intended to tell a story. This film does not. What does tell a story are the photographs on the wall next to the projection, and the plaques with quotes from some of the lay artists. Also on display are some of the sketches, bound in a huge book just behind the bench in front of the film screen.