Breaking Ground
September 23–24, 2023
The 17th annual Nuit Blanche Toronto will transform the city’s neighbourhoods and streets on the first day of fall with dazzling site-specific art installations, from 7pm on Saturday, September 23 to 7am on Sunday, September 24. The all-night celebration of contemporary art will feature exhibitions in Etobicoke, downtown Toronto and Scarborough, with more than 80 art projects from close to 250 artists from a variety of disciplines. Entry will be free for the public to engage with the art projects.
Theme and exhibition areas
This year’s Nuit Blanche theme, Breaking Ground, encouraged exploration within the arts community to focus on issues related to nature and pioneering change. Specifically, Breaking Ground invites artists to explore themes of climate change, the impact of urban development on communities and collective responsibilities around land and stewardship.
Three Toronto-based curators will present unique exhibition areas with their distinct perspectives:
Shoaling, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis: The Etobicoke exhibition (sponsored by Humber College) is a multivocal exhibition focusing on connections between land and water that link threads of memory, climate, race and labour through performance, video, sculpture and technologies. Exhibiting artists include Alvin Luong, Abedar Kamgari, Christina Battle, Dana Prieto, Reza Nik, Isabel Okoro, Soft Turns, Suzanne Morrissette, Yen-Ling Tsai, Isabelle Carbonell, Joelle Chevrier and Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing.
Disturbed Landscape, curated by Kari Cwynar: The downtown exhibition unearths centuries of development within Toronto’s financial district, as artists enact a series of creative reversals and disruptions to our built environment. With artists Divya Mehra, Naomi Rincón Gallardo, Krista Belle Stewart, Scott Rogers, Bonnie Devine and Jenine Marsh, among others.
In the Aggregate, curated by Noa Bronstein: The Scarborough exhibition (sponsored by Scarborough Town Centre) explores ideas of togetherness, friendship and collectivity that point to Toronto’s unique urban topography and public spaces transformed through the assembly of shared experiences. Featuring artists Christine Sun Kim, Thomas Mader, Eleanor King, Leeroy New, Mitchell Akiyama, Par Nair, Patrick Cruz, Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz.
More information about Nuit Blanche and a complete list of art projects can be found on the Nuit Blanche website at toronto.ca/nbto.
Partners, funders and sponsors
Cultural institutions partnering with the City of Toronto for this year’s Nuit Blanche Toronto include 401 Richmond, Aga Khan Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Artscape Weston Common, Artscape Wychwood Barns, Artscape Youngplace, The Bentway, East End Arts, Gladstone House, Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre (JCCC), Koffler Centre of the Arts, Museum of Contemporary Art Toronto (MOCA), Myseum of Toronto, Onsite Gallery, Story Arts Centre Campus at Centennial College, UrbanArts and Wildseed Centre for Art & Activism.
The City thanks the Government of Ontario for providing funding; exhibition sponsors Humber College and Scarborough Town Centre; sponsors Cadillac Fairview, Concord Adex, Johnnie Walker, QuadReal, Shine Foundation and Waterfront Toronto, as well as media partners Boom 97.3, CBC Toronto and the Toronto Star for supporting Nuit Blanche.
About Nuit Blanche Toronto
Nuit Blanche Toronto is the city’s annual all-night celebration of contemporary art, produced by the City of Toronto, in collaboration with Toronto’s arts community. Since 2006, this award-winning event has featured more than 1600 art installations by approximately 5,800 artists and has generated over $489 million in economic impact for Toronto.
