Nuit Blanche

Last night was Paris' 8th Nuit Blanche ("White Night," or all-nighter). It's a night where pieces of contemporary art are installed and opened to the public in locations all over Paris, from 7 p.m. until 7 a.m. You can probably tell from the time of this post (10:30 a.m. Paris time) that I didn't make it to the 7 a.m. mark, but I got to experience several sites in the Latin Quarter and the Marais, have a few drinks, and get to bed by 2. Pas mal.

The night began with a trip to the Jardin du Luxembourg to see a piece by Michel de Broin called "La Maitresse de la Tour Eiffel" (The Mistress of the Eiffel Tower). Suspended above the Jardin, from which you can see the orangely lit top of the Tour, was a disco ball that would have made Tony Manero from Saturday Night Fever drop his jaw, toss on his kicks, and hustle like there's no tomorrow (the biggest in the world, reportedly). In more serious terms, it was intended to remedy the fact that in big cities, one can't see stars.

From there, we visited the Musée du Moyen Âge to see a video installation, "I feel cold today," by Canadian artist Patrick Bernatchez. It was, appropriately enough, set up in the frigidarium, and according the the information booklet, was a film with "an ambiance of a futuristic apocalypse." I was less impressed with this piece, so I would have just said that it had the ambiance of an empty office being filled with fake snow (which it was), but hey, what do I know?

I do know that the street vendors had set up along the sidewalks by the time that we left the Cluny, and convinced by the heavenly smell of grilled meats that was floating on the air, we stopped to pick up beer and delicious merguez and grilled onion sandwiches that smelled and tasted divine.

From there, we visited the Grande Mosquée de Paris, which I was very excited to see in the inside of. The mosque always looks beautiful from the outside, but naturally, it's not opened up to the public that often. This, far and away, was my favorite installation of the night. The artist, Sarkis, had created some amazing pieces in the garden of the mosque, which is filled with beautiful vegetation and stone walkways. On two walls of the garden, mirror images of x-ray dogs were projected in soft, bright blues, while a piece from John Cage's Litany for the Whale played in the background. Under the open sky, it was peaceful, reverential, and simply stunning. In the next courtyard was an equally amazing piece, consisting of a beam of light, projected from the mosque's highest tower, hitting a mirror in the center of the courtyard, sending another beam of light back up into the sky. The mirror exhaled a scent of rosewater, which was supposed to represent the symbolic union of earth and sky, and which made the whole garden area smell soft, sweet, and lovely.
I couldn't get a good picture of the second courtyard installation (the one with rosewater and light) because of the darkness and my unsteady hand, but this gives you a bit of an idea:


Walking back home through the Marais, we encountered more videos, art vending booths, television screens with art films in shop windows, a waterfall being projected on the side of a building, and a bridge lined with color-changing blocks and videos of rainbows. We finished the night with a beer at the local café, which at last call was filled with Frenchmen trying (very eloquently, I must add) to convince the barman to give them one last round. I love living in a city where public art can bring 1.5 million people out of their homes at 2 a.m., and where drunk people can string together a very fluid, conversational, and congenial case for why they need more to drink. This really is a cultured city, in the most fun sense of the word.

And now, I must get dressed because this is the first Sunday of the month, when all the museums are free. More art! Hooray!