Seriously tho,

City of Toronto should consider the CN Tower light show to be a weekly occurrence. It would be so fun to hang out and listen and watch the lights go to the music.

Well I had a great time.

Started in Cabbage Town which was typical smallish installations that were of some artistic merit, but lacked any awesome nature.

Ice Queen was odd and over crowded. Inflatable silver bunny at Eaton Centre was neat and impressive.

Witches' Cradles were really neat at Brookfield. Union station was epic, lying on the floor when the fog starts pouring out and the loud recording of an old steam engine rolling into the station goes off. The midway rides looked neat, though I didn't go on them.

Monopoly game was kinda lame, but the guy in the crowd eating the paper Nuit Blanche brochure made it worthwhile.

Watching the CN tower at York and Front listening to the synched radio choons was pretty neat (great tunes too). Sky was beautiful.

The City Hall four letter word thing was impressive, but I wish we had seen it earlier when it was displaying actual words.

Whacked out chicks dancing to sax jazz on Queen across the street from the Sheridan hotel was effing weird.

Definitely a good cheap night out with good friends. I didn't wear enough layers so I was kinda cold for parts of the evening, but the Finlandia was useful enough.

The evening was peppered with crowd/group members perpetuating misdemeanor (and worse) acts which I won't describe here. Proper ******y followed us around the entire night.

Ultimately I think the best part of Nuit Blanche is seeing our fellow Torontonians out and about being social and civil and all sharing in a common pursuit. Not so unlike a party at a club.

quote:

Originally posted by StereoPrincess Seriously tho, City of Toronto should consider the CN Tower light show to be a weekly occurrence. It would be so fun to hang out and listen and watch the lights go to the music.

Anyone have a video of this?

Edit: I found it on youtube lol

We were out from 11 PM to 5:30 AM and saw at least a few dozen (probably more) installations in all 3 zones.

Outstanding event!

___________________
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Dark Dirty Tech Tribal. | Hands in air (trance) and feet on the floor (house).

quote:

Originally posted by DeleteFromUsers

right on. great review.

to me, this night is less about the art and more about going out and having a good time with thousands of other people. i had a great time with the people i was with, just wandering around, talking, and laughing.

the giant bunny was great. seeing something that big fill up the huge space in the eaton's centre was pretty cool.

the ice queen was a bit wierd. i was wondering what was going underneath that was causing her to flail like that.

the cage match in the bus terminal was cool. i can only imagine what someone coming in from out of town would've thought.

the city hall word thing was meh. last year's installation was much much better and set the bar high for any other installation that's every going to happen there.

loved what was happening on bay street. felt like a little part of the CNE was lost and left behind there with the rides and food.

union station was beautifully lit up in the front. and when walking inside, i whispered a little 'wow' when i saw it all in filled up with smoke. it really was an eerie place with those voice bouncing off the vaulted ceiling.

monopoly was a disappointing, nothing really to see there.

the vodka pool was cool..and tempting.

brookfield place was beautifully lit up as well. all those lights twirling and spinning inside would make it a cool venue for a big party.

and finally, i'm going to quote DeleteFromUsers because he hit the nail on the head about how i feel about this event...

quote:

Originally posted by DeleteFromUsers Ultimately I think the best part of Nuit Blanche is seeing our fellow Torontonians out and about being social and civil and all sharing in a common pursuit. Not so unlike a party at a club.

___________________
Deviant Art - Smuncky
My Photos on Flickr
If anyone wants to share their clubbing/nightlife pics go to Toronto Nightlife
"The best car-related innovation we have is not to improve the car, but eliminate the need to drive it everywhere we go.” -Alex Steffen

I had an OK night. Definitely not as good as last year, but not a complete waste of time either...the giant bunny was cool to see, the blind cage match was interesting but got boring really quickly, the city hall exhibit was crap compared to the lit up pong game and the light show we watched last year:




the only mildly interesting part of the monopoly exhibit was seeing Roger Mooking participate, and who really cares about that. The 'how to win the lottery' instalation was merely a lecture and the ghosts in the park were lame-o compared to the zombies of last year.


Did anyone happen to see the dancing cranes? This is one of the few installations that I thought sounded worthwhile but unfortunately didn't get to.

quote:

Originally posted by smuncky the vodka pool was cool..and tempting.

a friend of mine who was dared to stick a finger in it and try it (gross i know) confirmed our suspicions that it was in fact water and not vodka....

Overall, I felt like this Nuit Blanche was low budget compared to 2008...and yes, the TTC situation was very messy this year. The best part of the night was the combination of wandering the streets with drinks and friends.

___________________
"we're here for a good time...not a long time..."

Last edited by 1dawoman on Oct-05-2009 at 06:03

I don't really see how this is art but ok...

I was mostly around the Dundas area and quite frankly for my 1st Nuit I was pretty disappointed. The "events" were so small and shit it was kinda like wtf I'm walking around to see this? Really? The only thing really cool was the Battle Royale either then that they all kinda sucked. I did only check out the one Zone though...


At least the people were really chills and in good spirits.

quote:

Originally posted by smuncky to me, this night is less about the art and more about going out and having a good time with thousands of other people. i had a great time with the people i was with, just wandering around, talking, and laughing.

exactly, however this can be done any week and every week given we have free time and the weather co-operates... other people do nothing for me tbh, so I could care less.. if anything ridiculous line ups everywhere make it more annoying

this event is hardly what the organizers make out of it - most of the art is way too "wtf am I looking at?" kind of art

___________________
Just surrender yourself to the rhythm,
With your hands up in the sky,
Feel the energy deep inside your system
And leave this world behind...

quote:

Originally posted by FunkyCrew exactly, however this can be done any week and every week given we have free time and the weather co-operates... other people do nothing for me tbh, so I could care less.. if anything ridiculous line ups everywhere make it more annoying this event is hardly what the organizers make out of it - most of the art is way too "wtf am I looking at?" kind of art

REALLY??

Every week you can go out at 1 am in the morning and the streets are full of thousands and thousands of people? Where you can look at some really amazing things? have VERY funny conversations with crazy artists? go on a ride in the middle of the street? lay down in the middle of union station without looking like a homeless person? I could go on and on...

If you say yes to these questions we gotta start hanging out... because my average nights are not like that...


We all had a blast... even if we barely saw any exhibits... Review to come later

___________________
"House music is the soundtrack to the more deviant, exciting, rebellious side of life." -Lawler

wow... I'm so glad we got our crisis blankets before we got to union station cause they were perfect for lying on the floor with.

Yeah and it did suck that there were so many people.. cause it felt like we walked forever to get to specific events and then when we got to them and the line was 30/45/75 mins long we'd just keep walking to the next one instead.

I can now say I've walked right across toronto... haha or it felt like it.

And wow... how the conversation with one artist went from her camping out in the middle of a forest somewhere near the Bruce Peninsula so that she could draw the forest as she saw it around her... to her talking about how a large black bear was roaming the woods around her so the locals had to catch it and kill it... she remembered hearing mutilple gun shots... and then she actually saw how BIG it was after the bear had been strung up and cut open so it's guts were spilling onto the ground.... And then I think we all discussed how this was okay because in those areas people use all the parts of an animal... bear steaks for everyone.

and that is how we started our night...

The apology project was interesting... once we found it.... we definitely walked through it once only to turn around and walk right back... we then said sorry for changing out minds and getting in their way like that.

I think the weather was perfect... seeing so many people out late at night really got me confused about how late it actually was... Also... I really hope that peep show wasn't good, lol, since we definitely got to casa loma right at 12:59... only to decided that we probably couldn't sit through the show that started at 1....

And going to the washroom was a little difficult... we totally tried to go in the service door at casa loma but the wedding they were having there made that impossible.. so *a friend* decided to go pee around the corner of one of the mansions over there... it was an all around pretty awesome night

But yeah.. I agree with everyone else... The actual events weren't anything that REALLY made me think.. but it was an amazing adventure around the city...and all the events could be the exact same next year and I'd go out again for SURE

(Oh and the CN tower light show was pretty cool, at the very beginning of the night like 8:30 when I was driving down the highway it looked like the CN tower was spinning... trippy)

Nuit Blanche: a city changed
Posted by Kat Snukal

Yes the lines were too long, the streets too crowded, and the TTC too packed. And it’s true that this year, like the years before, the event didn’t seem to live up to its hype and many of the works underwhelmed. But, like almost a million other Torontonions, I spent Saturday night and the early hours of Sunday morning scurrying around the city to experience Nuit Blanche. And I wouldn’t have considered doing anything else.

While all our inner art critics and inner urban planners likely have a laundry list of criticisms about Saturday night, there’s a lot about Nuit Blanche that warrants celebration. Hidden within its flaws there are important lessons for urbanism.

One of the best things about Nuit Blanche is the fact that throughout the night there were thousands of people milling around downtown Toronto. Pedestrians, by their sheer numbers, took over the city’s streets and sidewalks. This reminds us of what a city could be were built for pedestrians. I was struck by this at 2:30 in the morning when I rode my bike past City Hall and saw its benches packed with people. And they weren’t there just to look at D. A. Therrien’s 4-letter word machine. Most people were simply taking a break from the night’s activities. When else but on Nuit Blanche would every bench at Nathan Philips Square be full on chilly night at 2:30 in the morning?

Nuit Blanche gives us a glimpse of what a utopian Toronto might look like. A city where the streets are vibrant, where public space is well used and where pedestrians, rather than cars, rule the city.

It’s not just more people using city spaces that makes Nuit Blanche interesting; it’s the way those people interact with those spaces that’s significant. Public spaces, private spaces and all the grey spaces in between have the potential to be transformed. I spent most of Saturday night in Liberty Village (Zone C) — one of the areas that best demonstrates the transformative effect Nuit Blanche can have. Liberty Village is an area with many parking lots that is often fairly low in pedestrian traffic. But with the streets closed, the area full of exhibits and the dramatic increase in people, existing spaces took on a new life. Parking lots became sites of play and areas of social congregation. Tom Dean’s 10 scattered Fire and Sausage sites (which gave passers-by warm hot chocolate, sausages or blankets) served as focal points and meeting areas. It seemed perfectly natural that hundreds of people were hanging out in parking lots or warming themselves by a fire in the middle of Liberty Street.

This transformation happened throughout the city. Amusement rides on a car-free Bay Street or the transformation of a bus station into a wrestling arena show us how our everyday urban landscape can be used in entirely different ways.
Through Nuit Blanche we see that spaces in the city and their associated functions aren’t static. With ingenuity and energy we can transform our existing urban environments and the way we live in them.

But despite Nuit Blanche’s potential to open up urban space, Saturday night also served to reminded us of how strictly controlled those spaces can be. It’s frustrating that so many of the exhibits had lineups of over half an hour. I waited almost 40 minutes for a chance to crawl under Norico Sunayama’s huge red skirt. I can’t understand why, on a night that is expected to draw almost a million people, some of the most publicized projects could only accommodate about 10 people at a time. Furthermore, this type of exhibit seems to result in the increasing presence of security guards. Security is needed to protect the artists and their work but I wonder why four security guards were necessary to control the traffic flow into Maria Legault’s the Apology Project. Ironically, while Nuit Blanche has the power to allow Torontonians to assert their right to the city, its immense popularity means that it’s becoming increasingly securitized and controlled.

While the promise of the exhibitions may be the initial motivation to participate in Nuit Blanche, I’ve found that the art isn’t the whole reason I look forward to the night. What keeps me coming back is to see how, every first Saturday in October, our experience of the city, its spaces, and the way we relate to them can change.

http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/10/05/n...a-city-changed/

___________________
Deviant Art - Smuncky
My Photos on Flickr
If anyone wants to share their clubbing/nightlife pics go to Toronto Nightlife
"The best car-related innovation we have is not to improve the car, but eliminate the need to drive it everywhere we go.” -Alex Steffen