Photo: Nuit Blanche au CCA, vue de la façade sur le parc Baile, 2008
© CCA, Montréal

Via CCA press release:

Saturday, 28 February, the Canadian Centre for Architecture invites the public to take action in celebration of its 20th anniversary and the 6th annual Montréal All-Nighter, part of the MONTREAL HIGH LIGHTS Festival. On the program: DJs, turntable workshops, interactive installations, video projections and video games, documentary film screenings, family activities, readings, a mobile sugar shack, and a tour organised by the Ordre des architectes du Québec (OAQ). Admission is free.

The celebration of architecture begins before nightfall: The CCA opens its doors free of charge at 11 am. Visitors are invited to absorb the theme of the night by taking part in guided tours of the exhibition Actions: What You Can Do With the City at 2 pm (in English) and 3:30 pm (in French). The exhibition presents 99 actions that instigate positive change in contemporary cities around the world. Starting at 8 pm, guides will be present to answer visitors’ questions. To complement the exhibition, a series of documentary films are screened in the Sottsass Room from 11 am onwards.

The public spaces of the CCA will be transformed into distinctive multimedia environments by the design collective Ilu, composed of Martin Laporte and Thien Vu Dang (VJ Pillow). The installation Cityspeak, created by Jason E. Lewis/Obx Labs experimental media studio at Concordia University, invites visitors to use their cell phones to write texts messages which will then be projected on the walls of the CCA. Obx Labs also presents TextOrgan, a real-time text performance installation, and the interactive touchscreen poem What They Speak When They Speak To Me. Untitled Project, by studio-laboratory Topological Media Lab (TML) with Morgan Sutherland and Michael Fortin, is a reactive video installation that responds to the movement of visitors within space. TML was established in 2001 to experimentally explore the use of hybrid computational-physical materials.

Continuing in this playful vein, the CCA invites youngsters and their families to enjoy an All-Nighter Under the Stars in the Shaughnessy House from 6 pm to 8 pm. Activities include games and drawings inspired by dreams, not to mention eating marshmallows!

Visitors to the CCA Bookstore can plunge into a world of shadows and dreams. From 8 pm to 1 am, La table des matières publishers, present Le livre de chevet (bedtime stories), in which each of sixteen coauthors of this upcoming book reads a twenty-minute ghost story. The event also marks the launch of the website www.latabledesmatieres.com.

Nuit Blanche au CCA, vue de la façade sur le parc Baile, 2008
© CCA, Montréal

Twenty years of the CCA are celebrated in an exhibition of catalogues and posters from throughout the institution’s history, a short film by François Girard about the building before its public opening, and a video of highlights from 20 years of public programs, featuring some of the renowned architects who have come to the CCA . In another nod to the history of the CCA, along with a bit of 80s nostalgia, a video game area will be specially set up with 1989 releases, including Mario Brothers II, SimCity, and the Game Boy console.

Finally, another attraction of the evening is a mobile sugar shack in Baile Park, courtesy of les Plaisirs de l’érable. From 6 pm until 2 am, pea soup, coffee, and maple drinks are served, while a maple taffee station should delight young and old alike.

At 4 pm, the Ordre des architectes du Québec (OAQ) offers guided tours as part of the Architectures en lumière event, established on the occasion of the 25th edition of the OAQ’s Prix d’excellence en architecture. The tour allows participants to discover the nominees for these prizes. Shuttle bus departures are at 5 and 7 pm in English and 4, 6, and 8 pm in French. $10 per person. A video entitled Architecture du moment will also have its premiere screening on the façade of the CCA.

Posted under Architecture, art, design