Nuit Blanche Paris 2009

[Deleted]

Well, last night I was out and about for the Nuit Blanche, which has definitely before bigger and more crowded than ever. However, I started by visiting the Cent Quatre quite early in the evening, before the crowds appeared.

In one of the first rooms, there was an animated montage of newspaper photos of war planes, set to Middle Eastern music.

       


Later in the evening, places like this are standing room only.

There was a "sound box" where strange dialogues played in trope mode but came out of different parts of the innter walls, unexpectedly.

Other artworks could be glimpsed as I passed through the huge hall.

The design store and the bookstore were open.

There was a big dance planned down on the level of the stables, but it wasn't starting until later -- only normal since it was supposed to last until 7 a.m. when the Nuit Blanche ends.

Next on my itinerary was a gymnasium displaying spinning air guitar photos with earsplitting electro music.

Sometimes you "get" conceptual art, sometimes you don't...

Then it was time to head for the Buttes Chaumont, one of the centerpieces of this year's Nuit Blanche.

(to be continued)

[bixaorellana]

Can you explain how this celebration came about, please? Is it very old? Also, is the "white night" a reference to the full moon?

For people who might ask about the Cent Quatre, here is the link to your thread about it.

[Deleted]

The idiomatic translation of Nuit Blanche is "Sleepless Night." The French version was created by the city of Paris in 2002, but other versions of all night artistic events existed beforehand, as can be read in the Wikipedia article, which nevertheless is totally unsatisfactory since it seems to confuse the one night only events of conceptual art with the various Museum Nights, of which the European 5th edition was held on May 16th this year. On Museum Night, the museums are free and they are open late, but it is not at all an all night affair, and it concerns the official art already on display the other days of the year.

For the Nuit Blanche, Notte Bianca or any of the other names, the whole point is to show you something that you will never see again.

[Deleted]

Interesting. In NOLA we have something similar which is called "White Linen Night" when all the major galleries in the Warehouse District have an open house. It is generally on one of the hottest(temperature wise) nights of the year.
The following weekend,the galleries in the lass gentile area of town hold "Dirty Linen Night",somewhat irreverent spoof on the aforementioned and much less pretentious.

[Deleted]

The Buttes Chaumont park was just up the street from the gymnasium mentioned above. It is directly across from the town hall of the 19th arrondissement, which had organized a parallel musical event to help people wait once entry to the park became rationed.

It wasn't even 9 p.m. yet, so I was able to enter the park without waiting.

The park isn't designed to be open after dark, and they made a point of not adding much extra lighting so as not to spoil the effect, so I took a last look at the city before plunging into the darkness.

But I had net yet completely left the world as we know it. A seller of merguez sandwiches was hard at work.

               

Children were even still able to go fishing for ducks, a rare treat after dark.

But then it was time to head off into the darkness. People were crowded around the edge of the lake. Why? I soon found out -- the lake had been filled with twinkling underwater lights and little paper boats, also with lights.

The little temple loomed above it all on the steep island in the middle of the lake. (This park was completely created from 19th century landfill.)

The moon was moody up in the clouds (and difficult to photograph without a tripod).

But wait, what was that over in one of the prairies? Oh, it was a lovely sight -- the umbrellas were in full bloom!

As I wandered up the hills of the park, I came across a flock of desk lamps that had gathered to drink from the stream.

The main group had stayed in a higher meadow to continue grazing in the night, when I suppose the dew makes the grass more delicious.

People weren't sure if the lamps might bite or not, so they kept their distance. However, it doesn't take much of an excuse for Parisians to organize picnics, even on a chilly October night.

(to be continued)

[auntieannie]

oh, fabulous! did you stay up all night, K?

I just love the installations within the Buttes Chaumont park. Maybe inspired by Pixar?

[lagatta]

I can assure all that the little temple atop Buttes-Chaumont is a very romantic place for a kiss.

Funny how any gathering in Paris or other large French cities attracts a merguez stand, whether it is a sporting event, a demonstration or whatever...

[Deleted]

It was time to make way up to the top of the park. I passed some sort of electric spider on the way.

The path to the temple was lit only by people's mobile phones and a few personal LED lamps. The only safe place was actually the Pont des Suicidés, formerly the most famous lovers' leap site in Paris besides the Eiffel Tower. Now it has a big fence on both sides. Once you have passed it, you are almost at the temple.

I think a lot of the people up there were seeing blurry naturally, but as for me, it was only my poor camera skills in the dark while being jostled all around. Otherwise, there is a truly spectacular view of Sacré Coeur from there.

Down at the main park entrance, things were getting more and more crowded.

I still had to work my way out of the back side of the park, where I knew there was a metro station. There was a big electric sign planted in the prairie.

Hmmmm.... What was that again?

               

The sign attracted picnickers like moths, and I heard much discussion about it, due to the difference with what the French version would have read. "No" or "zero" are never followed by the plural form in France, unlike English. So the fact that the word "miracle" was plural, people were wondering if it meant that there would be just one miracle instead of several.

I did not have the answer, but I did find a more discreet message in another alleyway.

My Nuit Blanche catalogue says there was also a third sign somewhere, but I did not see it. It reputedly said:

GATHERING OF STRANGERS

At the upper back gate was a café-restaurant mobbed with people and pulsating with music.

In one corner, people were getting massages.

Into the metro at last.

One of the corridors with moving walkways at Châtelet was decked out for the entire length with Japanese photo murals for the Nuit Blanche.

My next destination was "Luxembourg" although I was pretty sure that it would be a hopeless endeavor. There had been too much talk about the 7 1/2 meter diameter mirror ball suspended above the boat pond with dancing all around.

The mobs around the garden gates were enormous. Most of the street was impassible to cars and buses, because the people just would not let them by.

A sign had been put up saying that the wait to get in was approximately 90 minutes. I decided that I had better things to do, but I did get a glimpse of the ball from afar.

Where to go next?

(to be continued)

[Deleted]

It was hard to decide where to go next, since there were about 20 nearby sites from which to choose. I figured I needed to see another major deal, even if I had to wait, so I ruled out the 40 contrasting loudspeakers in Saint Séverin church or the ice film by a Montréal artist in the frigidarium of the Cluny Roman baths, and I went on to.... Notre Dame to see the illuminated plastic crystals.

What do you do when you have to stand in front of Notre Dame for about 40 minutes to get in? You take a couple of pictures.

A very entertaining Brazilian carnival parade came through the area, and that relieved the boredom of waiting a bit. I was standing behind some very affluent young Mexican tourists who had joined up with an Irish tourist, allowing me to follow the conversation a bit better. One of the Mexicans was fretting over having hesitated about bringing his pointy boots on his vacation and then seeing quite a few of them in Paris.

The crowd wasn't so bad once I finally got in the building. This specific art project was Swiss.

               

               

To avoid charges of blasphemy or whatever, they were also projecting a documentary about the history of Notre Dame on a giant transparent screen over the altar.

They probably could have fobbed off the traditional racks of votive candles as an art display as well if they had wanted to.

It was starting to get late for me, so I jumped on a Vélib to go a bit farther north and see the Arts-et-Métiers metro station. As far as I'm concerned it is the best looking metro station in Paris, since it recreates the universe of Jules Verne with a brass submarine style.

For the Nuit Blanche, the scenes in the portholes (miniature figures of scenes from 20,000 Leagues under the Sea and other novels) had been replaced by a photo project called "no ad billboard" -- blank advertising signs.

(to be continued)

[bixaorellana]

Yaaaay ~ so much excitement!

That moody picture of the folly atop the hill looks like an engraving from the era in which it was built, except for the gleaming bit of modernity in the bottom left. I absolutely adore the umbrellas and the flamingo lamps. All of Paris must have been out and about!

[auntieannie]

I continue to enjoy these pictures, K... but cannot help to think most of it would not have been allowed in the UK, for H&S reasons.

[Deleted]

My evening was winding down, and I only had two "musts" for the evening remaining on my list. However, after leaving the Arts-et-Métiers metro station, I almost immediately came across one of the innumerable small Gothic churches that are everywhere in Paris, and I saw that it had a Nuit Blanche sign out front. There were only a few people wandering in and out. What would I discover inside?

Ooooh... electric twirly disks! Is this the Holy Trinity or some such?



No, but there is a church connection. My little book says that it is meant to give a multimedia electronic impression of rose stained glass windows.

It's nice to have this display almost all to myself at 1:30 in the morning.

               

You know what? It looks a lot more spectacular in these photos than it did in reality. There were actually just little bands of light on the disks.

Well, I liked it anyway.

Next to last was the visit to the all-night swimming pool event with electric lightning flashes.

The effects were not the most spectacular in the world, but it was amusing to wander around an old fashioned swimming pool with the changing booths and all that stuff.

If they had not realized it before deciding to swim in the middle of the night, the rare swimmers now knew that they had become animals in a zoo.

I was starting to think that I would never manage to catch the lights flashing on my camera (I almost wrote "on film"), but finally I got a couple. Big deal. (The flashes are along the the top floor.)

The skating rink next door was nearly full, but I did not visit it.

And then it was time for my last visit, the closest to home along with the Cent Quatre. It was the bumpy football pitch set up on Place de la Bataille de Stalingrad (we all just say 'Stalingrad' of course, which surprises visitors).

People were still signing up to be able to play, but there was a warning sign out front.

Sporting fields like this would add quite a bit of spice to the matches. This is the work of an artist from Costa Rica.

And so, a little past 2 a.m. I decided that I had seen enough for this year, while regretting many of the things that I missed and which can never be seen again. But I know that next year there will be a whole new set of weird and interesting ideas. I jumped on a Vélib and biked home within 5 minutes.

I hope that other people get a chance to have a Sleepless Night in their cities, since the trend is still expanding. I definitely believe that this sort of thing is necessary to shake us out of our routines and make us look at well known places in a different way. We don't have to like all of it, but at least it makes us analyze the way we look at art and it also allows us to see how other people react.

[bixaorellana]

This is so fun! The discs of colored light remind me of Christmas in the Oaks -- a lighting event in City Park in New Orleans where I can never get anyone to go with me because they're all too cool and grown-up.

The colored lozenges in Notre Dame are an amazing visual treat. Love the portholes, and the sporting field is worthy of Lewis Carroll. It's all wonderful!

[lola]

Love it, K.

[imec]

This looks like a really fun night - and another good reason to visit Paris in the fall!

[fumobici]

Very interesting, thanks for sharing that.

[Deleted]

Today's newspaper says that the number of participants Saturday night was estimated at 1.5 million people (the people at each entrance were using little clicker counters as they let people in).

The biggest crowds were reported (obviously) at the Luxembourg gardens, the Buttes Chaumont and also the Grand Mosque and Notre Dame.

[bixaorellana]

The picture of the moving walkways shows a real glut of people, however the other photos of the Metro do not. What was it like down there later in the evening?

[Deleted]

Two metro lines were running all night, and the one I took was quite crowded leaving the Buttes Chaumont. However, most people seem to choose just one area to visit (there are at least 3 different Nuit Blanche zones each year) so they don't take the metro at all. I had originally planned to stay just in the 19th arrondissement (Buttes Chaumont, etc.) but I got swept up in the desire to see more things.

[Deleted]

[bjd]

Nice to see it was mixed.