Pharmacy Avenue Underpass — Indigenous Art Project

Neighbourhood: Scarborough · Address: Pharmacy Ave underpass, Scarborough (near Pharmacy Ave & Danforth Ave) · Hours: Open 24 hours · Price Range: Free

Why Visit

The Pharmacy Avenue Underpass brings large-scale Indigenous art out of galleries and into Scarborough's everyday streetscape, offering a striking visual narrative you won't find elsewhere in the city. The carefully curated murals are a thoughtful collaboration between lead artist Jarus, Indigenous artists, and community members.

What Makes It Unique

Unlike most Toronto mural projects, this underpass is one of the rare east-side sites curated with direct Indigenous leadership and storytelling. It features visual elements drawn from both Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe traditions, making it far more than aesthetic décor—it's a visual education and cultural statement rarely seen in public art here.

If you’re heading east and want Toronto street art that feels rooted in the neighbourhood instead of built for a social media wall, the Pharmacy Avenue Underpass is absolutely worth the detour. It’s part of StreetARToronto’s underpass beautification program, but that label undersells it a bit. This isn’t just a quick paint job to make a grey tunnel look less depressing. The underpass has real visual weight, and the murals feel like they were made to live in the space, not just decorate it. Large-scale Indigenous-themed works stretch along the concrete walls, created through collaboration between lead artist Jarus, community members, and Indigenous stakeholders, and that shared process comes through in the finished piece. You can feel that the project wasn’t rushed or treated like a generic civic mural assignment. It has intention.

The strongest thing about it is the way it translates Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe visual language into a Scarborough setting without flattening it into something generic or overly polished. The forms, movement, and colour all work with the architecture instead of fighting it. Underpasses can be brutal spaces, all shadow and noise and hard edges, so when a mural actually uses that long, narrow structure well, it stands out immediately. Here, the walls don’t just hold images; they frame them. From a distance, the composition reads clearly and confidently. Up close, you start picking out smaller decisions in linework, placement, and layering that reward a slower walk-through. It’s the kind of site where you notice something new the second time you pass, which is one reason I think it works better than a lot of mural spots that rely on one perfect Instagram angle and not much else.

The atmosphere changes depending on when you go, and that matters. Mid-morning is probably the sweet spot because the light tends to be more even and the underpass feels open without being washed out. You can actually see the mural details instead of fighting the darker pockets that come later in the day. In the early afternoon, the contrast gets a little harsher and the shadows become more dramatic, which can look good in photos but makes it harder to read the full work at a glance. Late afternoon and evening feel quieter and a bit more utilitarian. Cars still move overhead, people still cut through, and the whole place shifts back into a regular transit corridor rather than an art stop. That’s not a bad thing, but if your main goal is to really look at the work, daylight is the better bet.

What I like most is that the underpass still feels like part of the city doing its usual thing. People pass through on foot, cyclists move by, cars rumble overhead, and the sound changes as you step into the tunnel. That audio shift is part of the experience. It gives the artwork a kind of physical punctuation mark. You’re not in a formal gallery where everyone’s whispering and slowing down in the same way. You’re in a real public space, looking at art while someone else is on their way to work, school, or the bus. That makes the whole thing feel more honest. It also means you get a mix of visitors: a few people stopping to take photos, some locals moving through without pausing, and the occasional person clearly making a deliberate detour because they’ve heard the murals are worth seeing. There usually isn’t a crowd in the way you’d get at a famous downtown art spot, but there can be brief clusters of people if someone’s doing portraits or a small filming setup is there. Most of the time, though, it’s calm enough that you can take your time.

Scarborough doesn’t always get pulled into Toronto art conversations the way downtown corridors do, and that’s part of why this project matters. People can talk all day about Graffiti Alley, but east-end mural work is doing a lot of serious work too, and it often gets less attention because it’s not packaged for tourists in the same obvious way. The Pharmacy Avenue Underpass is a good example of why it’s worth widening your map. It shows how public art can change the tone of a place people would otherwise hurry through without thinking. The underpass itself is still an underpass, so no one’s pretending it’s a destination with cafés and retail and a big event-program feel. That’s actually part of the appeal. It’s a practical space that’s been treated with care, and the result doesn’t feel performative.

The neighbourhood context matters too. Around Pharmacy and Danforth, you’re in a part of Scarborough that sits between ordinary daily life and larger east-end movement patterns. It’s not a polished art district, and that’s precisely why the murals land differently. You’re not entering a curated pedestrian zone with branded signage and predictable foot traffic. You’re in a real corridor that serves local residents, commuters, and people moving between different parts of the city. That means the work has to hold up without fanfare. It does. It also means the experience is more about noticing than being entertained. If you go expecting a big destination with a visitor centre vibe, you’ll miss the point. If you go with the right expectations, it feels much more grounded and more meaningful.

In terms of practical advice, go in daylight if you can, and if you’re planning to photograph it, bring a little patience. The underpass is easy to access, but the lighting can change fast depending on the weather and time of day. Overcast skies can actually be helpful because they soften the shadows and make the colours feel more even. Bright sun can work too, especially if you like strong contrast, but some sections may read darker than you expect. If you’re trying to get wide shots, give yourself room on both sides of the tunnel and don’t just shoot from the middle and leave. The structure really benefits from angle changes. Walk it once in one direction, then turn around and walk it again. The murals reveal themselves differently depending on your perspective, and the framing of the bridge supports changes how the whole thing reads.

There’s not much in the way of a wait time because this isn’t a ticketed or timed attraction, which is one of the nicest things about it. You just show up. Crowds are usually light, though like any public space, you may run into local foot traffic at certain times of day. I wouldn’t overcomplicate it. The best strategy is to keep it simple: go when the light is good, keep an eye on your surroundings like you would anywhere in the city, and take your time enough to actually look instead of treating it like a quick stop for one photo. If you’re visiting in winter, the tunnel can feel colder and a bit more stark, which makes the murals pop in a different way. In summer, the place feels more open and easier to linger in, and you’re more likely to see people casually passing through on foot or bike.

This is also one of the better examples of StART’s Indigenous commissions in the east end, which is important because the program has done a lot to push Indigenous public art into places where it can be seen by regular city users, not just people making a special trip. If you’re interested in that work, keep an eye on @startoronto because the city’s commissions and programming do change, and it’s worth checking what’s new before you head out. The Pharmacy Avenue Underpass stands out because it doesn’t feel like a token commission or a checkbox project. It feels considered. It also feels like a place where Scarborough’s identity isn’t being explained from the outside but expressed from within.

If you’re making a full east-end day of it, this fits nicely with other Scarborough stops rather than standing alone. Pair it with a walk at the Scarborough Bluffs if the weather’s good, and you’ll get a completely different side of the east end in the same outing. One is concrete, colour, traffic sound, and public art in motion; the other is open sky and water and a much slower kind of landscape. That contrast makes both spots feel stronger. And if you’re into murals generally, this underpass is a good reminder that some of Toronto’s strongest public art doesn’t always sit in the most obvious places. You sometimes have to go a little out of the way to find the work that actually says something about the city.