Saturday, October 04, 2008

Art In The Nightless City


This is the third year for the contemporary art event known as Nuit Blanche... For the third sleepless night, Toronto is transformed by artists, art in galleries, museums and unexpected places. From bridges and tunnels to warehouses and stadiums, with more than 155 destinations

My evening begins close to home as Church street is transformed into the ETHEREAL FOREST - A Night In Molly Wood's Bush.
Trees and bushes spring up for two blocks as a hazy fog cuts through the various venues. In all there over ten art installations and five live dance performances.



I make my way down a crowded Younge Street at almost 9 pm the streets are totaly alive for this all night event.

Dundas Square is ground zero for Scotia Banks Information hub!

It's in the middle of Eaton Centre that I experience Fujiwara Takahiro’s "Into the Blue" is a giant, illuminated, transparent cone-shaped balloon. Its shape is achieved through the stacking of inflatable donut-shaped soft acrylic tubes of successively diminishing sizes. "Into the Blue" will presents two distinct faces. From a distance, it reflects and refract the surrounding light. Up close, one is able to walk beneath the work and experience it as an environment. Looking up into the interior presents a dazzling light array, refracted through the complex layers of soft acrylic material.




From Eaton Centre I move to Nathan Phillips Square for Stereoscope 2008, an interactive light installation in Toronto City Hall. This installation is presented by the German group Project Blinkenlights and transforms the landmark towers into a huge display screen by arranging lamps behind each of the 960 windows of the building. The façade serves as an ever-changing and evolving kaleidoscope of graphic animations automatically generated and interactively orchestrated. In fact the public directly influences "Stereoscope" through a variety of interfaces including smartphones, the web and physical controllers located right at Nathan Phillips Square.





Here is a brief clip of the towers in action!

In only two years, the economic impact of this event has increased from $1 million to $4.9 million. More than 500 artists and 125 cultural institutions participated in the 2007 event, and again this year the TTC remained open all night for only the second time in decades! Support from the arts community, corporate sponsors and the City of Toronto has been unparalleled – providing the resources to further expand the event into new exhibition sites, to improve traffic flow and increase the scale and scope of monumental art projects. Additionally, a Volunteer Advisory Board was established to assist in selecting and guiding curators and the curatorial process for years to come. The event is highly dynamic, evolving to reflect the talent and vision from which it began. Toronto continues to embark on its cultural renaissance, and no event reflects this more than Scotiabank Nuit Blanche!
Note: All images and text (not specified) is copyrighted by Christopher Cushman. This site does not specify or denote the sexual orientation of any model and as such please post your comments accordingly.

No comments: