Last fall, Stephanie Yee and Lux Habrich made the cover of The Coast, with a 30-foot Chinese dragon between them. That dragon, constructed of clear tarp, was the pair’s Nocturne festival contribution. It took over an expanse of the Halifax waterfront for the duration of the outdoor art celebration, representing themes of identity and anti-Asian […]
Nocturne
Nocturne wants your project pitches
Nocturne, Halifax’s annual nighttime art extravaganza, dropping a week earlier than usual this year on October 19, is looking for project pitches. The year’s theme, as set by curator Tori Fleming, is SCAFFOLD, which aims to “explore how temporary structures can be used to make a larger commentary on the social, physical, and political structures […]
Unendorsed Nocturne exhibit vandalizes Halifax waterfront
An anonymous photo-booth cutout of John A. MacDonald was drilled down into the Halifax waterfront during Nocturne last Saturday night, standing for a brief period in opposition to the art festival’s anti-colonialism theme. The cutout was a defence of John A. MacDonald and his relations with Indigenous peoples. It featured an “I’m OK with John […]
Arts groups pen open letter about AFCOOP sexual assault allegations
Five organizations have released a statement in the wake of accusations of sexual assault against a staff member at the Atlantic Filmmakers’ Co-operative. (As detailed here last week.) The Centre for Art Tapes, Khyber Centre for the Arts, Nocturne, South House Sexual and Gender Resource Centre and Eyelevel Gallery—and all of their staff and board […]
Holding space for BIPOC artists in the Halifax art world
Nocturne applications will now include a series of optional self-identification questions about race, gender and religion, as a direct result of discourse about the gap in representation and visibility of Black, Indigenous and Persons of Colour within the local visual arts community. Kelly Markovich, the programming director for October 14’s Nocturne festival, says this year […]
A Nocturne 2017 round-up
Keeping with this year’s “vanish” theme, the art from Saturday night has left the city streets. Thankfully, we have Instagram to keep the memories alive. Check out highlights from Nocturne’s 10th anniversary below. A post shared by Benjamin Lemphers (@blemphers) on Oct 15, 2017 at 8:36am PDT A post shared by Laura Selenzi (@lauraselenzi) on […]
Trophy
Exhibit 500, Ferry Terminal Park, 88 Alderney Drive, Dartmouth We typically understand a trophy to be something awarded with success, something you collect with an achievement or milestone, but for the organizers and participants of Trophy, these milestones may take less positive, but equally as important forms. In a pop-up tent city, 15 storytellers sit […]
Nocturne 2017: Shimmer and shine
On Saturday, October 14, the 10th annual Nocturne: Art at Night casts its light across Halifax and Dartmouth for an evening of innovative, immersive, interactive installations. Featuring over 100 exhibitions across five zones, you’ve got just six hours on Saturday to soak up all the culture you can. This year’s theme is vanish—“an act of […]
Striving for Light-Based Connections
Exhibit 203, NSCAD Academy Building, 5163 Duke street and Citadel Hill A spotlight may bring particularly theatric or cinematic scenes to mind: Bright movie lights or a single beam illuminating a soloist on stage. Alternatively, a beacon can bring to mind images of distress: A bat signal, or a lighthouse. Mark Hines’ installation Striving for […]
Revisionist Landscapes: Luminary Forestation
Exhibit 136, Museum of Natural History, 1747 Summer Street In this interactive piece, viewers are invited to assist in reconstructing a forest by travelling the city with paper lanterns. The ecosystem of an Acadian forest is a unique combination of evergreens such as red and white spruce, as well as deciduous trees like sugar maple […]
Wait Outside with Your Necklaces On
Exhibit 117, Public Gardens, 5665 Spring Garden Road A decade ago, Martha Cooley was mugged in the city. A few years back she made a short super-8 film called Wait Outside with Your Necklaces On about that time. “I wanted to transpose that experience—it’s taken me 10 years to think about it, and what the […]
Folded River
Exhibit 400, Common Roots Urban Farm, Bell Road at Robie Street In Folded River, artist Alex Balkam’s creative process is mined to create an immersive piece of expanded cinema. Working with Thomas Evans and Jonathan Mandeville of Passage Studios, Balkam reconstructs a version of a landscape he’s known since childhood, one that he returns to […]

