Nuit Blanche Toronto 2023

The Dinner Table by Nike Onile at Nuit Blanche 2022

Nuit Blanche Toronto Returns September 23

Nuit Blanche Toronto will transform the city’s neighbourhoods and streets with a dazzling array of art installations from 7 p.m. on Saturday, September 23 to 7 a.m. on Sunday September 24, 2023. The annual all-night celebration of contemporary art will feature exhibitions in Etobicoke, downtown and Scarborough with art projects from over 250 artists from a variety of disciplines. It is also an opportunity to engage with partner-produced projects and enjoy free entry to 18 of Toronto’s outstanding arts and culture organizations.

Follow Nuit Blanche Toronto on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @NuitBlancheTO to get the latest updates on #NBTO23.

Flotilla, 2022 by Leeroy New

Theme & Exhibition Areas
This year’s theme, Breaking Ground, prompted exploration within the arts community, focusing on nature and pioneering change. 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 three unique exhibition areas with their distinct perspectives:

Shoaling, curated by Lillian O’Brien Davis: the Etobicoke exhibition (sponsored by Humber College) enters 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.

Disturbed Landscapes, 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 environments.

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 experience public spaces transformed through the assembly of shared experiences.

Learn more about the theme, curators and exhibitions.

Artists
Nuit Blanche aims to uncover and highlight artists who challenge the status quo through media, form or content, to transform public spaces and inspire audiences to experience Toronto in new and meaningful ways, featuring works from award-winning artists, Divya Mehra, Bonnie Devine and Alvin Luong, along with emerging talent including Joy, Par Nair and Tristan Sauer and more.

A Practical Guide, 2023 by Divya Mehra. Photo: Night Gallery, Los Angeles

Highlighted Works

• Leeroy New’s Balangay Starfleet reimagines ancient Philippine boats into futuristic bamboo and plastic vessels suspended mid-aerial encounter.
• Caementarium, a multimedia installation by Dana Prieto and Reza Nik, engages with the former site of the Mimico Asylum, now Humber College’s Lakeshore Campus.
• The elsewhere collective’s Crack in the Case is an immersive multimedia installation using projections, ribbon, frames, portals and mirrors.
• Wellspring by Jenine Marsh upends Nathan Phillips Square, revealing the forgotten space beneath. (Funded by the Government of Ontario).
• Your Wish is Your Command by Divya Mehra pokes at colonial underpinnings in Toronto’s financial district with a magic lamp.
• Suzanne Morrissette’s light and screen installation to notice urges visitors to pause and observe the shapes of leaves and movement of trees as they trace the movement of wind.
• Lifelines showcases work by the Black Arts Fellowship’s inaugural cohort at the Wildseed Centre.

Browse the full list of works presented at Nuit Blanche Toronto 2023.

Partner Institutions
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 Daniels Launchpad, 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.

Funders & Sponsors
The City of Toronto would like to thank the Government of Ontario; exhibition sponsors Humber College and Scarborough Town Centre; sponsors Cadillac Fairview, Concord Adex, Johnnie Walker, Waterfront Toronto, the Sunshine Foundation, QuadReal 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 almost 1,606 art installations by approximately 5,800 artists and has generated over $489 million in economic impact for Toronto.

Get the latest news on Nuit Blanche and other City of Toronto events delivered to your inbox. Subscribe to the CelebrateTO newsletter.