Planning a quiet night in tomorrow? Maybe just watch a movie, then go to bed early to catch up on sleep? It might be time to cancel those plans. Starting Saturday as the sun sets at 6:51 p.m. and running until sunrise at 7 a.m. Sunday morning, the city will be decorated and illuminated by more than 110 temporary art installations from an even greater number of artists for the 8th annual Scotiabank Nuit Blanche festival.

Puente de Luz / lightbridge, image by Sarah Keenlyside

The free all-night event will feature three distinct exhibition areas as well as a collection of independent projects scattered throughout the city. This year we are not only looking forward to high profile displays like Ai Weiwei’s Forever Bicycles sculpture at Nathan Phillips Square, but also illuminated landmarks like the temporarily LED-lit Puente de Luz Bridge in Concord CityPlace: those lights are going to dance!

Stacked chairs at Queen and Church for Scotiabank Nuit Blanche, image contributed by Jason Cook

Since its inaugural run in 2006, Nuit Blanche has featured over 850 official art installations, created by roughly 3,500 different artists and has become a must-visit event for the growing art community, while generating more than $138 million in economic impact for the City of Toronto.  To keep the city moving during this nocturnal event, the Yonge-University-Spadina Subway will run all night from St. Clair West to Eglinton and the Bloor-Danforth Subway will run all night from Keele to Woodbine. A special Nuit Blanche TTC Day Pass is available for $10.75, with unlimited use from the start of TTC service tomorrow morning until Sunday morning at 9:00 a.m.

If you take your camera to Scotiabank Nuit Blanche, share your photos after the event in either our Flickr pool or in the City Videos & Photos section of the UrbanToronto Forum, and you may be featured in our Nuit Blanche article next week!