Getting ready for the Nuit in Ottawa Tonight

It's 2:27pm and I am getting ready for Nuit Blanche Ottawa.
Start time 6:22pm. End time 4:23am.

I'm already over-tired and I don't usually stay up past midnight so much anymore. What I do recall are having the best, most enlightening, and funny conversations, after 1am. Wouldn't it be great for that to happen again with all these ARTISTS around I keep saying to myself as I wonder how I will keep my eyes open and I wonder how long we will *really* last--and how long everyone else will last for that matter. 

I have wanted to do a Nuit Blanche since I attended my first one in Toronto: http://plasticmasters.blogspot.ca/2008/12/nuit-blanche-in-toronto-october-4th.html

 But here I am, four years later and this is what I'm doing or my first Nuit Blanche as a participant:

http://drawingthelinecollective.blogspot.ca/2012/09/dtl-at-nuit-blanche-ottawa-september.html


Basically, I'm seated on a chair, on the sidewalk in front of the Ottawa School of Art in the Byward Market, with my two drawing partners seated on chairs in front and behind me. We each start drawings in our sketchbooks that we pass amongst ourselves, working on a page until we decide it is done. Inspiration will come from everywhere, and from you too if you happen to be there.

Depending on the weather, (it was SUPER rainy this morning--kind of a muted sunshine right now) and the light levels, we'll stay outside for as long as we can take it, then move inside the Ottawa School of Art up to room 405 where we will have installed huge sheets of paper around the room. Here you can join us in our drawings. We have a bucket of supplies for you to use and we'll respond to your drawings as well as to ours.

Our event is quiet compared to some.

Around us at the School of Art will be 14 other art events, not to mention those set up in the Byward Market area and then in Hintonburg and the one I would like to get to myself is in the parking lot of the Enriched Bread Artists studio on Gladstone Avenue. Rob Hinchley, my great former printmaking instructor, and 3 others are creating GIANT woodcut prints using 4' x 8' wood panels for the block and then pressing them to the paper with a steam roller.

(Note to self: I'm going to have to try that when I get home.)

Nuit Blanche Ottawa Website here: http://nuitblancheottawa.ca/

Nuit Blanche Ottawa approaches ... 27 days and counting

large DtL Collective drawing, detail   graphite, charcoal, pastel, paint, ink

DtL (Drawing the Line Collective) will be performing drawing, sidewalk style, at Nuit Blanche Ottawa on September 22nd. We're going to be up all night, along with many, many other Ottawa artists in this inaugural Nuit Blanche evening for the city.

Drawing the Line is a collective consisting of three members: myself, Gail Bourgeois and Shirley Yik. More info, for the curious, can be found here: DtL
 

The best part will be doing a DtL project with my friends and seeing what happens over the course of the night.

our public drawing area at Blink Gallery with happy participants

The worst part will be not being able to see all the other art events because I am part of one of those events. Not such a terrible problem, of course, but I'll have to rely on the reports of others.

You'll be able to find us on 22 September 2012 - 6:22 pm – 4:23 am in front of the Ottawa School of Art (one of the festival partners) and up on the 4th floor of the school if we're not outside.