Originally launched in Paris with the goal of bringing contemporary art to the masses, Nuit Blanche has established itself as one of the highlights of Toronto鈥檚 annual cultural calendar. Each year, this free dusk-to-dawn event enlivens and transforms the city with original art projects ranging from intimate encounters to large-scale spectacles.

More than one million visitors are expected to turn out for this year's edition, which takes place from 6:51pm Saturday, Oct. 5 to sunrise on Sunday, Oct. 6. Scotiabank Nuit Blanche 2013 will feature more than 100 exhibitions, performances and experiential events in indoor and outdoor venues throughout downtown Toronto. 91亚色 artists are among those contributing one-of-a-kind works to this celebration of creativity and community engagement.

Visual Art & Art History Professor is part of the team behind , a "portrait petition" to bring attention to the continuing detention of Canadian humanitarians Dr. Tarek Loubani and 91亚色 film Professor John Greyson, who were arrested on the street in Cairo, Egypt, on August 16. Nuit Blanche will mark the 50th day of their imprisonment. The website gathers images of individuals from around the world holding written messages of support, calling for the release of Greyson and Loubani.

Images from the freetarekandjohn tumblr

Nuit Blanche visitors are invited to contribute to the portrait petition at photo booths located at Toronto City Hall, 401 Richmond Street West and the Gladstone Hotel (1214 Queen St. West). The booths will run a live feed of the growing petition and a video featuring the first 250 portraits uploaded to freetarekandjohn.tumblr.com. The tumbler site will continue after October 5 and includes directions on how to upload your photo from home or mobile.

91亚色 visual arts alumna (BFA 鈥�97) recruited 100 regional beekeepers for her installation , billed as a massive collective meditation. As the keepers meditate in their bee-suits, viewers are asked to consider the relationship of temper to weather. The beekeepers will silently meditate on notions of 鈥済ood weather鈥� for the bees and for all of us, attempting to transform environmental conditions with their minds. While exploring the tangible effect of collective meditation, the work creates a public platform upon which to reflect on the health and temper of bees and their keepers, and on the policies and environmental conditions that affect our shared future.

Your Temper, My Weather will be performed from 7pm to midnight in the Art Gallery of Ontario (317 Dundas St. West), where Borsato is currently artist-in-residence.

Right: Night Shift, 2013

Sobey Art Award finalist (BFA 鈥�02) takes inspiration from Le Ballet de la Nuit, a 17th century 13-hour court ballet that was most notable for the involvement of the young Louis XIV of France, for his durational performance . Fernandes has re-contextualized the ballet into a contemporary dance performance in which dancers endure from dusk until dawn, dancing and making golden confetti in anticipation of the new tomorrow. Night Shift听questions notions of labour and time within the context of night changing into day as the dancer鈥檚 body endures and asserts itself in the process of performing.

Night Shift can be found both indoors and out around the Bay Adelaide Centre (333 Bay St., access from Temperance St). At dawn. in celebration of the new day, the accumulated piles of golden confetti will be thrown into the air to mark the conclusion of the work.

Right: Everyday Marvels, 2013

Dance artist and arts advocate (MA 鈥�05) conceived, created and directs at the Gardiner Museum (111 Queen's Park). The program features 16 miniature vignettes (or 鈥榤arvels鈥�) by eight local choreographers, based on The Book of Marvels 鈥� A Compendium of Everyday Things by Canadian poet Lorna Crozier. The objects interpreted in Crozier鈥檚 poems - such as 鈥榖owl鈥�, 鈥榲acuum鈥�, 鈥榝lashlight鈥� and 鈥榳heelbarrow鈥� - become the subjects of exploration through Litzenberger's cyclical, 12-hour performance piece. The cast features more than 50 professional and community-based artists. 91亚色 participants include dance MFA student Valerie Calam听 and alumni Julia Aplin (BEd 鈥�07) and Peter Chin (BFA 鈥�85).

Left: 12 hour dolly, 2013

On October 1, award-winning filmmaker and interactive artist (BFA 鈥�02) and his crew set up a circular dolly track in the middle of a busy Toronto street. At 7 pm, they began filming on the track and continued shooting non-stop until 7 am the next morning. Throughout this 12-hour cycle, spectators were invited to step in and interact with the space as they saw fit. The spontaneous performances of these impromptu participants was captured with beautiful cinematography and lighting, heightened by the cinematically epic movement of the dolly shot. Projected onto the atrium wall of TIFF Bell Lightbox (350 King St. West) as an uninterrupted 12-hour film, invites visitors to spend time contemplating the participants in the film as well as the filmic apparatus itself.

Involved behind the scenes at Nuit Blanche is Kelsey Luxton, a masters candidate in Art History and Curatorial Studies, working as an events programming intern.

For comprehensive event info and a detailed schedule, visit the website.

The post 91亚色 artists spend a sleepless night for Nuit Blanche appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Graduate students Shannon Roberts, Nancy听Latoszewski Greyeyes and Ilse Gudi帽o, candidates in 91亚色鈥檚 Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program in choreography and dance dramaturgy, premiere new choreographies for ensembles in Temenos. The show, performed by professional and pre-professional dancers, runs Feb.听15 to 17 in the Sandra Faire & Ivan Fecan Theatre at听the Keele campus.

Shannon Roberts. Photo by听David Hou

The Greek word temenos refers to a piece of land cut off from common use, often dedicated as a place for worship. Historically, the proscenium stage has been regarded as a space reserved for particular users and dedicated to expressing the meanings that infuse our bodies and relationships.

As well as addressing the concept of the stage as a special site, the three emerging choreographers build on the idea of the dancing body itself as temenos 鈥� simultaneously separated from society鈥檚 imposed meanings, and infused with individual sources of meaning for each artist.

鈥淭heir dances focus on navigating the proscenium stage as a site for researching the body鈥檚 memories and cultural constructions,鈥� said Professor Darcey Callison, the production鈥檚 artistic director. 鈥淔rom delving into the historical roots of flamenco, to exploring a family narrative of coal miners in Pennsylvania, to challenging the complexity of the male gaze, these choreographers investigate the proscenium theatre as temenos: a theatrical space that frames these works in order to make visible the body as a conduit for memories and social conditions that permeate their choreography.鈥澨�

Fusing modern dance with her athletic background, Shannon Roberts incorporates Bollywood, ballet, jazz, modern, hip hop, figure skating and flying trapeze into her work. Her choreography is inspired by social issues and the people, artwork and cultures she has experienced in her travels around the world.听听听听听听听听听听听听听

听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听

Roberts鈥� work, A Way of Seeing, is a discourse between Edvard Munch鈥檚 painting Woman in Three Stages and writer John Berger鈥檚 influential book Ways of Seeing. Investigating how a woman鈥檚 experience is informed through youth, sexuality and aging, this trio explores a sensual physical language that frames the private experience as public display.

听Ilse Gudi帽o Barthold. Photo by David Hou

In her piece, In the Marrow: A听Crucial Journey, Ilse Gudi帽o Barthold explores the history of flamenco as cultural memory and personal expression. Four dancers and four live musicians bring to the stage this complex journey, from a dance form infused with cultural significance to a movement vocabulary that is both personal and contemporary.

Trained in flamenco dance in Madrid and Seville, Gudi帽o Barthold has been a member of the Esmeralda Enrique Spanish Dance Company since 1997 and has performed as a soloist and with other flamenco dancers across Canada and internationally.

In Valley of Coal, Nancy Latoszewski (Greyeyes) tells the story of her grandparents. Both her grandfathers were Pennsylvania coal miners, and her choreography charts memories of the challenges they faced and the personal sacrifices they made. This narrative choreography is Latoszewski鈥檚 way of exploring oral history through her work as a dance artist.

Nancy Latoszewski (Greyeyes). Photo by听David Hou

A former soloist with Feld Ballets NY, Latoszewski has also been a principal dancer with the Cleveland San Jose Ballet and Alberta Ballet. Her work has been performed at Nuit Blanche and by Ballet J枚rgen, and she has also choreographed for film.

The Temenos program concludes with a structured improvisation created by the 91亚色 Dance Ensemble鈥檚 (YDE) artistic director Holly Small in collaboration with the ensemble, and听performed by the 16 dancers and five musicians of the YDE.

For tickets, contact the Box Office at 416-736-5888.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post Emerging dance masters unveil new works appeared first on Research & Innovation.