Nuit Blanche is celebrating its 18th anniversary in Toronto on October 5 with another all-nighter packed with performances, interactive installations, photography exhibits and more! With its origins reaching back to the 1989 Helsinki Festival’s “Night of the Arts,” Nuit Blanche has expanded to become a worldwide nighttime arts festival, with over 120 cities participating throughout the year. This year’s theme in Toronto is “Bridging Distance,” inviting audiences to explore ways in which they experience and perceive distance through various artistic mediums.
Scattered across the city, from the Harbourfront to the Botanical Garden, and from Humber College’s Lakeshore Campus to the Aga Khan, there are over 80 works by local, national and international artists to see and experience. Luckily, this free event lasts from 7pm to 7am, giving audiences plenty of time to catch them all.
If, however, you’re not quite up for a full 12 hours of exploring Toronto (we don’t blame you!), we’ve got our eyes on a few works that we think are worth checking out.
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Nuits des Mauvais Jours
The world’s longest running queer theatre, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, will be hosting a night of ballroom and pop-art performances, video installations and an opportunity to leave a love letter to a missed connection! Described as a “full-facility function that bridges underground scenes,” this is a great place to start your night, explore the theatre, celebrate all things queer and dance the night away!
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Metipso Portal International
The Metipso Portal Collective is bringing bi-continental connection from Metipso, Kenya to Nuit Blanche at OCAD. During this 12 hour experimental broadcast, Toronto audiences will experience live interactions with the mud hut media lab, located on the edge of a protected forest in the highlands of Central Kenya. With the chance to experience talented performances from both locations, visitors can also participate in a live Zoom call where they can meet and interact with a member from Metipso.
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TIZITA – Coded Whisper
If you find yourself in the West Queen West neighborhood, drop by It’s OK* Studios for the Tizita – Coded Whisper installation. Winta Hagos, an emerging visual artist dedicated to celebrating and advancing Black art and culture, is the mind behind this sonic installation. Weaving sound, visuals, and storytelling to explore a “distant past into a living, breathing utopia,” Hagos hopes to draw us into the very heart of our ancestral flame.
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I KISS YOU IN PUBLIC
For audiences who are feeling particularly romantic, head to stackt market for Print19’s I KISS YOU IN PUBLIC exhibition. Addressing the privilege of demonstrating affection in public, I KISS YOU IN PUBLIC invites visitors to kiss to show their support for the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. Originally an act of resistance against anti-2SLGBTQIA+ policies, kiss-in protests not only send a message of solidarity, but also highlights the discrimination that the queer community still faces. Participants are encouraged to post a photo of their kiss on social media and tag @weareprint19 for the artists to share, connecting all participants.
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Closer Together
With something as simple as two grandstands positioned face-to-face, this interactive exhibit hopes to bring us all closer together. Created by Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster, they hope to turn the audience into the performance and the interactions between them into the artwork by removing the distance usually created by a field or stage between two grandstands. Visitors are invited to observe and be observed in this intimate exploration of the connection between strangers.
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