Eric Freifeld - Dundas Street

Eric Freifeld
1919-1984
RCA

Title: Dundas Street
Date: 1947
Medium: Watercolour
Image size in inches: 13.75 x 19

Condition: Good

Notes: Signed lower right. Verso with inscription: "'Dundas Street' / 1947 / Eric Freifeld / To Johnny & Malke, / One painting I thought I'd ever [sic] sell. / Eric Freifeld."

Was Freifeld aware of the local allegations of the seemingly innocent sandwich shop in the centre of this work? 
Freifeld painted this at the corner of Dundas and Pembroke, just east of Jarvis, about 79 years ago. Beneath the Sweet Caporal cigarettes sign you can just make out Norm's Sandwich Bar, an old Toronto establishment with a gritty reputation. Apparently a well-known "centre of crime and vice."

It was not the first time; locals had been clamouring to revoke Norm's license since the 50s, but it wasn't until 1974, after extensive hearings, that it finally happened.  It was deemed a “blight on the community” and “a contact point for criminal activity in the vicinity." "Owner Leslie Den argued that he couldn’t be certain that the crime was happening in his establishment, but the Commission argued that as owner he had a duty to be aware and to prevent soliciting on his premises."

What, if anything, did Freifeld know? Perhaps Freifeld’s inscription on the back gives us a clue…

P.S. – look lower left and note the obvious reference to the infamous photo of “V-J Day in Times Square”, taken just 2 years prior.