Six Weeks in Toronto

Art is all around

Both young and old people pulled an all-nighter. On Nuit Blanche (“white night”), the festival of contemporary art, nobody seemed to stay at home and go to sleep. People walked on the streets, strolling from exhibitions to pubs and vice versa. Could it be that a whole city is interested in contemporary art?

Probably not, but than the festival had served one of its purposes: drawing initiated as well as laypersons. To be honest, I belong to the second group. Actually I was more attracted by the feeling that something special was going on and finally by the atmosphere than by the program. In cities all over the world, similar events take place, for example Nuit Blanche in Paris, Noche en Blanco in Madrid, but I have never been to such an all-nighter. I began my tour through Toronto in a zone which was themed nightsense. Firstly, I walked to Berzcy Park. There, just outside of the centre, I took part in the project “12 Hours of Power”. I thought it is more interesting to cycle myself to bring light to the darkness as to look on other people who verify the functionality of a dynamo. The artist Denise Ing wanted to show visitors, I suppose mainly children, how much work it is to empower a bulp or a water spout. I had chosen my starting point because I had read about the Berzcy Park in the afternoon. The place is named after William Berzcy, a German born artist (about 1744) who had been the head of a group of settlers. They made their way to Toronto and after this they settled in Markham.* Ing‘s choice has obviously nothing to do with that.

In my search of Canadian-German connections on Nuit Blanche I went to an exhibition of Dan Mihaltianu who was advertised as an artist from Berlin although his nationality is Romanian. He called his installation Vodka Pool. Visitors of the Commerce Court West were actually able to gaze at an artificial pond filled with alcohol – and with coins. It seems that people tend to throw money into anything that is reminiscent of a fountain. As soon as someone starts many others follow. “The reaction of the visitors is part of the artwork”, a volunteer told me. Therefore we both also tossed 10 cents into the pool. “Currency to currency”, comments Dan Mihaltianu behaviors like this. As I asked him why he uses alcohol, he referred to the description in the Nuit Blanche program and his associations of liquor and liquidity to banks and money: “Intoxicating, like the euphoria of riches; evaporating, like the vanishing of investments during economic downturns; alchemical, like the transformation of use value into exchange value.” But not every visitor reacted in the same way and added some “liquidity”. Some wanted to consume art more intensely than others. One guy made himself a long straw to taste the vodka. Not really appetizing when you regard that objects like coins and even a paper boat were lying and swimming in the pool.

After that I saw many other installations with sound, with light, with dancing, but I couldn’t find my personal highlight. Nevertheless or perhaps for exactly that reason I went to the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art (MOCCA) a few days later. The exhibition gave attention to ice hockey in pictures, sculptures and installations. I liked most a kind of puppet film. The artists recorded a match at a hockey table, but you can see only the player figures. They were filmed in long shots as well as in close ups and a reporter commented the scenes like a real game.

Perhaps on Nuit Blanche I had given up just before I could reach my highpoint. I finished my art run-out after 3 am in a line in front of Massey hall. I wanted to attend the sound installation “Space Becomes The Instrument”. It was my second attempt to go inside and listen to a concert in which the artists performed in the audience seating area. From the stage the visitors could watch them play a 30-metre-long piano. Earlier in the night I had been hold off the huge crowd waiting in front of the hall. A couple of hours later the situation was quite the same. Should I stay or should I go? I was undecided until a voice was telling me: “Don’t wait.” In fact, it was a teenager who came out of the hall, but I thought: “You are right, for me it is time to go home.”

* http://www.markham.ca/mpl/heritage/history/settlemarkham.asp
** http://www.scotiabanknuitblanche.ca
*** http://www.mocca.ca