YYZ Artists' Outlet was established as an artist-run centre in 1979. The exhibition Representations: YYZ in the 80s is a chronological record of shows that took place at YYZ in the 1980s, which dealt with issues of representation. It compiles photographs of exhibitions taken from YYZ's archives, art writing and art criticism as well as recent interviews of major figures in the Toronto art community of the 80s to give a more complete history of YYZ and Toronto's art world at that time. As curator Philip Monk remarked in his interview for the exhibition, artist-run centres are places where Canadian art history is played out. In this sense, Representations: YYZ in the 80s is not only an exhibition archiving the exhibition history of YYZ, but is also an important contribution to Canadian art history.