Milestone fetes in Montreal and Toronto | Canada Voices

Mount Sinai hosts The Gala of the Century, Sept. 12, Toronto

Nearly every one of the 2000 seats inside Toronto’s Four Seasons Center for the performing arts were filled on the evening of Sept. 12 for a fundraiser titled ‘The Gala of the Century,’ hosted by and in support of Mount Sinai. The event celebrated the 100th anniversary of the remarkable and internationally-recognized acute care academic health sciences centre, which opened in Toronto in 1923. It took nearly 10 years of knocking on neighbourhood doors for a group of four women from Toronto’s Jewish community to raise the $12,000 needed to start the hospital. This latest gathering raised $12.5 million to support the Sinai 100 Fund, an endowment established to ensure the institution’s prosperity well into it’s next century. Following cocktails in the centre’s atrium, comedian and actor Martin Short took to the main stage to emcee the big event, which included the premiere of a Barry Avrich-directed doc which explored Mount Sinai’s history and impact in Toronto and around the globe, and a headlining performance by Canadian-born crooner Michael Bublé. Gala Co-Chairs Jennifer and Ken Tanenbaum and Leslie Giller and Andrew Hoffman spoke, as did Ontario Premiere Doug Ford; the CEO of Sinai Health System, Dr. Gary Newton; and the CEO of the Sinai Health Foundation, Joseph Mapa. Among those in the audience: Gary and Donna Slaight whose Slight Family Foundation was a key sponsor; Colliers CEO Jay Hennick and his wife Barbara, who were major donors to the event; Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow; philanthropic duos Earle and Janice O’Born and Max and Heather Gotlieb (who both serve on the Sinai Foundation Board); An abundance of Sinai board members including K2 Pure Solutions Chairman David Cynamon, CEO of Metropia Howard Sokolowski, and KingSett Capital’s Rob Kumer; RP Investment Advisors CEO Richard Pilosof, current chair of the Foundation board was there, as was immediate past chair Maxine Granovsky Gluskin.

Bal du MAC toasts 60 years, Sept. 14, Montreal

The first phase of Royalmount, Quebec’s largest private development which is home to posh shops, restaurants, office and green spaces was recently unveiled, and for the night of Sept. 14 it served as the locale for Bal du MAC, the most important annual fundraiser for Montreal’s Musée d’art contemporain. Nearly $1 million was raised at the gathering, which was also an opportunity to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Canada’s first major institution dedicated entirely to contemporary art. With major renovations of the museum, which is housed in Montreal’s Quartier des Spectacles, under way, a temporary home in Place Ville Marie has been an interim hive of MAC creativity, with twice annual exhibitions and a plethora of programs (which the gala raised funds for) all still on offer. Stephen Bronfman, one half of the Claudine and Stephen Bronfman Family Foundation and a co-chair of the MAC’s major fundraising campaign; Julie Couture, an artist who also heads the MAC Foundation’s Board of Directors; and Laurent Ferreira, President and CEO of National Bank were the evening co-chairs. Filling the room were some 800 guests, indulging business types like entrepreneur Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien III and Groupe Dynamite CEO Andrew Lutfy, and arts movers including gallerist Antoine Ertaskiran, Chief Curator at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts Mary-Dailey Desmarais and filmmaker, singer and activist Alanis Obonsawin, whose work is the subject of a major MAC exhibition opening September 26. The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs, MAC board members including Sara Jolicoeur, Eva Hartling, Francis Guindon and Marie-Josee Simard, who also sat on the organizing committee and Anne Lebel, Executive Director of the MAC Foundation, were all there too.