Nuit Blanche 2008 recap

I had high hopes for Nuit Blanche 2008 when I read that organizers were going to tackle two of my biggest complaints: over-crowded venues and under-servicing by the TTC. The TTC service was slightly better though I ended up outpacing one Queen St. streetcar after being prevented from boarding due to its full load. However, the lessons learned from the two previous years made for an event that held its visitors out of arm's reach though, at times, for good reason.

The biggest disappointment about the 2008 edition of Nuit Blanche was the lack of interaction with the public. In their bid to accommodate as many visitors as possible, many art pieces were featured in large scale venues and barred viewers from participation. I Promise It Will Always Be This Way by Jon Sasaki featured costumed team mascots performing to crowd pumping music in Lamport Stadium. The audience was not allowed on the field but relegated to cheering from the stands. In spite of the fact that the mascots frequently ran by, giving high fives to audience members and tossing balls into the crowd, the overall effect was strained because of the barrier.

In contrast, the piece that Lamport Stadium housed last year, Locust by Noboru Tsubaki featured a giant inflated locust who sat silently as visitors jumped and crawled all over it when the lone security guard was not within shouting distance. The ability to interact with the giant locust caused an awe and giddiness in the visitors that all the loud music and fist pumping of Saski's work could not muster. Unfortunately, Tsubaki's locust did suffer from the love bumps of visitors and had become severely deflated by 2am, according to one first hand account. Hence, the barrier is understandable though regrettable.

The distance between art and audience was maintained throughout the 2008 exhibits. Overflow by Michel de Broin featured a waterfall flowing from a third floor building window onto the ground below. Even though a public park surrounded the building, a chain link fence relegated visitors to peering like unwanted protesters from the sidewalk. Security is an understandable concern, but it is doubtful that the artist intended for the fence to become such a distraction from his work.

Even in the absence of an actual barrier, I often found myself standing at a respectable distance from the work, within a crowd. I felt like I was at a busker's festival as I watched Toronto City Hall light up like a pixel board (Stereoscope by Project Blinkenlights), a giant, inflated cone spin (Into The Blue by Fujiwara Takahiro, seen on the left), people smashed stuff (SMASH! Droppin' Stuff by The Custodians of Destruction), and beat drums (Sound Forest by Tova Kardonne and Christine Duncan). Sound Forest was especially disappointing as I had expected a more free flowing experience with the promise of "trees full of voices" and encouragements to "wander through, listen to the ten ambulatory choirs". Instead, a ring of spectators boxed in the performers and prevented newcomers from seeing anything.

One could claim that this is the price Nuit Blanche pays for its growing popularity. To accommodate the crowds, a distance must be maintained. Yet, art pieces from previous years welcomed visitors en masse while removing physical and mental barriers. 2006's Fog in Toronto #71624 by Fujiko Nakaya covered Philosopher's Walk in an artificial mist. Large crowds wandered throughout the surreal environment without major issue. Similarly, large crowds of visitors explored Lower Bay TTC Station for 2007's The Ghost Station by Kristen Roos, and were engulfed in the sound installation.

The only 2008 piece that integrated its audience into the art was Horroridor by Kelly Mark. In the York Street Concourse under Union Station, visitors walked between 20 foot screens featuring non-stop clips from horror movies accompanied by a barrage of screaming on all sides. Mark's piece was not met with the laughter that one might expect from a late night crowd in an uncomfortable situation.

The tomfoolery of rowdy idiots coming from the bars and clubs to Nuit Blanche after 2am has been under reported in the media. Apparently, a leg was broken during 2006's Ballroom Dancing by Darren O'Donnell after drunken participants joined in on the large scale game of dodge ball. O'Donnell slyly made reference to the need for security with his 2007 entry, Dancing with Teacher, where a security guard presided over the velvet rope that separated actual teachers from prospective dance partners in the audience.

In the bid to make Nuit Blanche accessible to a wider audience, the organizers have sacrificed intimacy in favour of security, and catered to the lowest common denominator. Much of the work featured in 2008 lacked the depth of previous work, focusing instead on superficial entertainment. Throughout the night, loud and obnoxious parties infringed on the enjoyment of works that lacked any audio component to drown out their comments.

Perhaps it is too much to ask for more work like last year's ThunderEgg Alley: A Dumpster Diver's Paradise by Swintak. Swintak's conversion of an industrial dumpster into a luxury hotel room was intimate, thoughtful yet amusing, and we were lucky to arrive when it was highly accessible. However, the corporate sponsor probably was not thrilled by the obscure location that Swintak's work resided in since it does not allow for maximum exposure of the brand to the public.

Only 2009 will tell if Nuit Blanche organizers choose to continue catering to a wider, fickle audience who want easy access to cheap thrills or if the event will be returned to the city's art enthusiasts. On the plus side, the large volume of participants in Nuit Blanche proves that Stephen Harper's claim that art events do not resonate with "ordinary people" is moot.