There are no black painters among the famed Group of Seven. Art collector Kenneth Montague doesn't mind though, it's the dearth in the rest of the Canadian art establishment that he has spent many years trying to rectify.

"The Canadian art scene hasn't caught up to the rest of the changes that have happened in the rest of Canada," Montague explains. "It's very non-diverse."

His art collection -- mainly photos but also video art, paintings and sculpture -- cannot possibly remedy an institutional gap that infiltrates galleries, dealers, art schools, prizes, awards, and the other connections and events that together comprise the Canadian art scene. But with hundreds of photos worth in total several hundred thousand dollars, it is a sanctuary for any artist, black or white, exploring themes of black identity. Housed in an undisclosed Toronto storeroom, Montague's collection is like a traveling Michael Lee-Chin Crystal, a taste of Toronto loaned to galleries across North America. His collection -- like the fast-talking Montague himself -- is constantly on the move, and is often on display at several places at once. Currently, pieces from his collection can be seen at the Art Gallery of Hamilton and Stateside, he has loaned a painting, Blood by US-artist Barkley Hendricks (which was featured in the November 2008 edition of the New Yorker magazine) to Houston's Contemporary Arts Museum. Montague has worked with the Art Gallery of York University, producing an article with artist Brendan Fernandes (available in their bookstore) and in the fall, he will curate an exhibition at the Royal Ontario Museum.

The point isn't to be omnipresent, with Montague-owned works on every street corner, but to fill an emotional gap, a visible need for works about black identity. The absence is personal, he says. Growing up in Windsor in the 70s, black history was not part of the school curriculum and many of the black role-models and stereotypes in the media, were "a bit silly." Feeling isolated, and often the brunt of racial jokes and taunts, there was a "desperation," he says, to his quest to learn more about his culture.

"Sometimes the racism would be as blatant as the kid saying a black joke in the class and the class would laugh. Sadly, I might laugh along with them because it was either laugh or cry."

At age ten, a trip to The Detroit Institute of Arts introduced him to a black culture that could be "rarefied and elegant," he says. The iconic photo Couple in Raccoon Coats (1932) by US artist James VanDerZee (pdf), depicting two African Americans dressed to the nines in matching calf-length fur overcoats, made such a statement about the rich possibilities of black style, about a life that could rise out of poverty and prejudice and find success, that it sparked a serious interest in art.

"Seeing those images of Harlem in the 1920s made me want to learn more about that culture," he says.

The absence of stories and representation about black culture prompted Montague to start buying and showing photos. In 1997, he opened a gallery out of his home, called Wedge in a former knitting factory. The gallery was challenging � it left him very little time for his personal life � but, explains Julie Crooks, a Toronto-based curator, it provided a space and platform for black artists. "The black community were largely shut out from the mainstream art community. Ken garnered attention for the black diaspora from the black community and from the art world as well."

His word, opinions and knowledge have become well respected in the international art circuit, she says, and so Wedge opened the doors for a lot of Toronto artists. "Ken works really hard at what he does, and he's kept that momentum and passion for so many years."  

Collecting serious artwork is not for the poor and in Canada you need a day job so Montague pays for his acquisitions through his dental practice on Bloor and Bathurst. Since opening it in 1992, Montague has become known for his drill-side manner and cosmetic dentistry and fills the cavities of Toronto's glitterati � such as Nelly Furtado, Metric's Emily Haines, author Russell Smith, George Stroumboulopoulos, poet George Elliot Clarke, and members of the Hollywood elite, such as Russell Crowe, when they are in town.

The money made on the celebrity circuit is ploughed back into the works in the Wedge collection, and by visiting and lecturing at art fairs worldwide. Montague tries to meet every artist before buying their work. The personal relationship is encouraging, explains Megan Morgan, a biracial photographer who explores themes of identity politics and the relationship between the personal and political in her works. Montague goes beyond a mere collector to become mentor to his artists, by keeping them in the loop with what's happening in the international art world, and by phoning and emailing words of encouragement, says Morgan, who is based in Oakville but lives part of the year in California, where she's pursuing her master's at the San Francisco Art Institute.

"He always has his finger on what's happening and it provides me with a way to connect to the larger world," she says.

The collection aims to reflect the diversity of the Toronto black population, Montague says, although it houses works from artists from around the world, including Canada, U.S., South Africa, Eritrea, both black and non-black, as long as their work deals with themes of black identity. The diversity of Toronto's black population is one of its strengths, bringing multiple cultures, histories and stories into our mix. But without a unanimous voice, it can mean the community can struggle to be heard, and can be politically under represented, he explained. The collection strives to bringing together a range of stories and identities, giving a home to a minority that is underrepresented, offering some coherence, a shared narrative, or a visual symphony from the dissonance.

"There are works out there that Canadians and the world needs to see," he explains. "There was a need to tell these stories, so I decided to do it."  

Alexandra Shimo is an author and journalist based on the Ossington strip. She has lived in several cities, including London, Montreal, New York and  Washington D.C. and is now proud to call the T-dot her home.