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Toronto, Ontario, May 2004. "Part of a series I am working on, 'Made in Canada I' is a manhole cover on a residential Toronto street, surrounded by a beautiful yellow succulent plant...

We're used to making quick jaunts to the St. Henri Home Depot for less-than-decorative items like tung oil, nuts and washers and aluminum angles. But a recent search on their website for yet another hardware run yielded this unexpected find. Turns out you can buy signed prints of local Toronto artist Michael Hyman's photography right there at Home Depot, framed and ready to go...

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Oak Island, Georgian Bay, May 2001. "I was taking a break on this island cottage deck - this curious little guy was interested in my lunch - he came as close as five feet when I took this photo. The lines on the wet deck, the bars behind, and on the raccoon itself, yield an interesting and ironic background for this bold little bandit."

0528_hyman01.jpgWe're so unaccustomed to seeing local or regional offerings at big box stores that this really stood out to us. Could the benefits of expressing the regional differences throughout our culture finally be scratching the surface of big global business?

Even more nuanced and focused on locale, Hyman's website, ducttapedesigns.com includes location maps of each photograph. Click on the map and you can see the exact location where your photograph was taken. That manhole cover up top? Right here at Bathurst Street and Lonsdale Road.

The artwork at Home Depot comes in 11x14 to 16x20" sizes. Each print is in a black gallery-style frame with black canvas matting, priced from $85 to $195 CAD and available at Home Depot stores in Canada.