Ordinary buildings, quiet parks, secluded alleyways, and a mass of zombies all came alive for Toronto’s third annual Nuit Blanche, an all-night contemporary art festival lasting from dusk on October 4 until dawn the next morning, and showcasing the unique, eclectic, and sometimes obscure visions of artists from all over the world. Centered mostly in the downtown core, a total of 155 projects teased out the hidden artistry of such landmarks as City Hall, Maple Leaf Gardens, and the underbelly of Union Station, as well as the street corners, parkettes, and courtyards we traverse on a daily basis without giving a thought to their creative potential. Even the TTC, usually dormant in the early hours of a Sunday morning, contributed to the celebrations by extending service hours and operations, in some cases throughout the night.

Nuit Blanche (White Night), or “sleepless night” in French, is an apt description of the annual all-night cultural festivals that began in Paris in 2002 and now take place annually in cities all over the globe, including Madrid, Brussels, Montreal, Rome, Tokyo, and Tel Aviv. Toronto joined these ranks in 2006, with a successful rendition of Nuit Blanche that saw 450,000 people attending and over 400 artists and curators participating. These numbers grew to an attendance of 800,000 in its second year, with more than 500 artists and 125 cultural institutions taking part.

Spanning the downtown region from Dupont to Front, and from Landsdowne to the Distillery District, this year’s Nuit Blanche was divided into three zones, each containing a mix of commissioned and open call projects, independent projects, and special exhibitions in established galleries, including the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Royal Ontario Museum. And as was expected when facing a huge array of high-concept projects designed by an international cast of artists – often purporting to challenge, reinterpret, question, or explore set notions in society – the results were mixed: some pieces inspired, some disappointed, and some just confused.

Horroridor (Kelly Mark, Toronto, Canada), one of the campier pieces of the night, transformed a hallway in downstairs Union Station into a literal corridor of horror. Three screens lined both walls, bombarding viewers with clips of scream scenes from horror-thriller films such as King Kong, Evil Dead, The Shining, Home Alone, Chucky, Scream, Kill Bill, Saw, and many more. Standing in the middle of the hallway, one is surrounded by a constant barrage of primal screams.

Taking advantage of the nighttime environment, Zombies in Condoland (Jillian McDonald, New York, USA) encouraged passersby to play zombie (costume tents and make-up artists were on hand to assist the unprepared) and take part in the film shoot set up in College Park. Meant to poke fun at the swell of increasingly homogenized urbanites moving into soulless condo buildings, this exhibit scores extra points for the all-night spectacle of running into zombies all over the downtown core.

Stereoscope – Project Blinkenlights (Tim Pritlove and Thomas Fiedler, Germany) turned the façade of City Hall into an epic lights display. By installing lamps behind each of the 960 windows of the building, the creators produced a medley of images, symbols, patterns, and even gigantic games of Pong and Space Invaders.

The spontaneous cries of “Penis!” that rose up from Nathan Phillips Square, accompanied by people pointing to the sky, was my first introduction to r u part of the art? (Farah Yusuf and Alex Stephan, Toronto, Canada), one of the most original ‘performance’ pieces of the night. By texting “yes” to 647-989-7707, you received a series of text message instructions over the course of the night, such as starting a conga line, speaking a made-up language to anyone who will listen, and following a light into Riverdale Park, Cabbagetown.

On a more subtle scale, Toronto Nocturnes I (Ricardo Okaranza, San Sebastián, Spain) featured a panoramic cityscape photographed at night, printed on a translucent cloth and wrapped around four pillars to form a giant photographic cube. An inner light set the cube aglow, illuminating aspects of a dark and deserted city scene that usually go unnoticed.

Other exhibits simply sounded better on paper than their real-life incarnations. Into the Blue (Fujiwara Takahiro, Tokyo, Japan) featured a giant translucent blue cone-shaped balloon suspended in the middle of the Eaton Centre. It was supposed to reflect the light in interesting patterns whether you viewed it from a distance or from the bottom, but after trying both, it still just looked like a giant blue balloon. The line to walk through House of Leaves (Katherine L. Lannin, Toronto, Canada), a 20-metre-long or so alley at Ryerson University papered with thousands of book pages, stretched around the block, but I was able to take in most of the exhibit by slipping around to the exit. Over in Liberty Village, Purified by Fire (flames consume the windows of a building) and Overflow (a waterfall gushes out of an upper-storey window) provided an interesting juxtaposition and appealing prospects, but were much less impressive up close.

Despite the uninspiring nature of some of the exhibits, and the disappointingly small scale of others, most of the fun and excitement of Nuit Blanche comes from the overall spectacle. Downtown Toronto was bustling all night with participants, viewers, docents and volunteers, and a heavy police presence. Information tents provided maps and programs, and it was easy to find each exhibit, even without the tall white flags denoting its location – you just had to follow the crowd. Quirky, diverse, and completely free of charge, the joys of exploring such an unpredictable artistic landscape alongside thousands of curious Torontonians was well worth pulling an all-nighter.

Written by :

Miriam

 

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