Nuit Blanche is an annual event which is the culmination of the two-week arts and culinary festival Montréal en lumière. Nuit Blanche is an all-night party featuring art galleries, restaurants, musical and theatre performances attended by thousands of people. Being a relatively new arrival to the city, I had the chance to partake in my first Nuit Blanche here and thought I would share some of the galleries I visited below.

Galerie d’art Michel-Ange was an interesting stop. Wet booted visitors were greeted with hot coffee and had a chance to look at the colorful pieces in the Pop Explosif show. Featured artists included Boudro, Norma Bessières, and Roger Katch showing their variations on Pop Art.

Galerie MX, a two level gallery with large windows located right next to the Place-d’Armes metro station, was the second gallery I had a look at. With a lot of variety of sculpture and paintings to look at, I spent a good hour here taking in the en[V]isager show. Some of my favourites were pieces from Jean-Pascal Fournier, Michel Desroches, Niso Maman, and Sylvain Coulombe.

The last stop and the one I found the most interesting was the debut of Art Souterrain at Nuit Blanche held in Montreal’s underground city. Close to 140 contemporary artists showcased their latest works in the vast 7km network of tunnels. I made sure to check out the Séripop interactive piece which was designed to show ‘the human destructive presence on spaces’ it began as large pieces of colored paper glued to the floor. As the night wore on, large pieces were torn off by the passers-by, and by 1am the tunnels were filled with garbage. Check out the video below.

Nuit Blanche Montréal-Art Souterrain