By reputation Queen Street West is one of the most dynamic gallery districts in Toronto, if not in the country. It is also an art strip with an attitude characterized by irreverent and brash young art, bohemian lifestyle and a party scene ranging from the grungy to the chic and glamorous. During the day, the street looks ordinary. At night, when the fun seekers arrive in droves, the place comes alive and its greyness gets swallowed up by the night lights.
What if we probe beyond these trendy popular perceptions and explore this area's past? What if under the protective veil of the night sky we peel away layers of history and make visible what has been obscured and forgotten?
For one sleepless night Queen Street West will be reclaimed, as it is declared on billboards by the First Nations of North America. In Trinity-Bellwoods Park the memory of the ancient Lake Iroquois is hauntingly evoked and the rushing waters of the buried Garrison Creek are heard once again in a large interactive media installation. Further in the park a Dada-esque cabaret of Happenings invites participation in the fantasy world of a nonconformist outsider humanity in an installation that summons the memory of former patients of the mental health institution that first opened its doors in 1850 as the Provincial Lunatic Asylum. You'll find a Cuban family metaphorically "living" in the West Side Lofts sales office, sharing stories about the transformation of their Old Havana neighbourhood into a tourist paradise and their fear of losing their home. In car washes transformed into movie theatres, stories about aboriginal life and values, immigrants' hopes and dreams, and the hard life of working people will be told by some of Canada's foremost video artists. On the other side of the street, in the Royal Car Wash you'll find a large block of ice that holds pieces of floating red fabric signifying a life-size form, the body absent. Life is fragile. The ice will melt, and with the morning light Nuit Blanche will also come to an end.
As Queen Street West is poised to reclaim its former glory, as the fashionable garden city it once was in the late 19th century, Nuit Blanche remembers the ordinary people who at one time lived here and shaped its legacy. Hope you'll enjoy the journey.
Clara Hargittay
