Night\Shift layers sound, space and experience
Few spaces are more ordinary or passive than an office-building hallway. These long, narrow expanses, dotted with the occasional acrylic landscape exist solely to bring you somewhere else. Night\Shift, Kitchener’s placehacking festival has another idea.
The once blasé hallway on the second level of 44 Gaukel is currently clad from floor to ceiling with an infinite mirror installation animated by the sound made within it. The result is a layered, interactive art piece that will act as a stage for a number of musicians during Night\Shift’s five-day range.
This hallway isn’t the only venue reimagined for this festival – downtown Kitchener will be transformed in its own unique way after dark from November 1-5.
Pictured: Misha Marks plays in the INFINITY TUNNEL.
“I stopped calling it a Nuit-Blanche style event and I didn't pursue a theme, says Eric Rumble, Night\Shift’s coordinator, describing the festival’s still-growing identity. “It's a night where there's a whole bunch of different spaces that you might not otherwise know that are suddenly animated.”
This year’s Night\Shift calendar boasts 40 different visual artists, 20 musical acts, 18 venues and 23 different pieces of programming across the city’s core, all of which has been guided by one principle since Night\Shift's inception.
“It's really just about creating opportunities for practising artists here to re-imagine spaces,” says Rumble.
And reimagine they will. Highlights on Night\Shift’s map include a window-sized comic strip at Mercury Café, unsalvageable guitars given new life by tech companies and a 24 hour filming process where a camera is manually pulled on a dolly while passers-by are invited to do whatever they sit fit within its range.
“Layers are a big element of this year. What can be combined together? What visually and sonically can be played off of one another?” says Rumble. “What kind of experience and installation can you mash together?”
This event, though coordinated solely by Rumble, is brought together by a passionate board, stakeholders and volunteers who have pounded the pavement for Night\Shift’s sustainability. Crowd-funding campaigns (varying in success) are part of the after-dark festival’s history, but when the sun comes up, and the animations are packed away, Rumble returns to racking his brain for ways to keep Night\Shift viable.
“Additional stakeholders need to bring programming into the festival in order for it to work. That's partially the philosophy behind enlisting a bunch of tech firms to build guitars, or having Admission of Guilt and Friendzone Collective to produce a showcase,” he says. “Ultimately, to survive that's the direction that the festival needs to go. More people need to take ownership of it.”
Even with uncertainty on Night\Shift’s horizon, Rumble’s optimism about what people will experience could make any listener forget the festival is in a period of evolution.
“You’re going to be surprised by something. You’re most definitely going to form a new memory of a space that you recognize as something else or haven’t been to and you’re probably going to discover a local artist,” he says, pointing back to infinite mirror hallway, where music is echoing between the narrow, glassed walls.
“This is an experiment, it’s always exciting not knowing what to expect.”
An interactive installation by nik harron and Bernie Rohde; the INFINISCOPE kaleidoscope and sound reactive projections by nik harron.