“Crowd” by Kristan Horton

Nuit Blanche installation review
“Crowd” by Kristan Horton

by Ghazaleh Etezal
10 Oct 2007

I got off the subway at Bay and decided to begin my exploration there and meet up with my friend. While waiting for him, I walked around the Yorkville area and saw a huge line up for something. It wasn't huge; it was gigantic and I had no idea what it was for. I was a bit disappointed to see that line; it wasn't something I had experienced last year at Nuit Blanche. I then found out that the lineup was for the Bay subway "ghost station" which was apparently really cool. I really didn't feel like lining up for anything for an hour. My friend arrived and we just started walking around. Both of us were tired that night and we had not thoroughly reviewed the handbook and didn't know exactly what the hot-spots were. We did remember that we had wanted to check out the Japan Foundation, since we're both very intrigued by Japanese culture. So, our first stop was there. Line up --again, but this one was short and it was for a gallery exhibition of a Canadian woman's paintings from her trip to Japan's rural communities of individuals with bright colours and Japanese influenced vibrancy.

I didn't find it anything spectacular...really. We were actually both expecting Japanese art since we were in fact in the "Japan Foundation". So, the first stop wasn't very exciting. We then passed by the ROM, which didn't have anything but a bunch of people standing in front of it and lights were being projected on the Crystal expansion. Nothing to see there and I was getting agitated because a: I didn't like overwhelming crowds and b: I was worried if the whole night was going to be like that and if I was actually going to enjoy an experience.


We walked down to the U of T and our first choice was to see the wolf and deer installation, but we couldn't find it and I think if there were actual wayfinding signs for the installations it would have been very convenient, but that's just my opinion.

U of T campus was...interesting? I don't know what the balloon was all about, or even the squash courts. I found them meaningless and not very engaging. I don't think public spaces were used enough at Nuit Blanche. Big fields could have been used more effectively, especially when you're dealing with a massive herd of people strolling through from site to site.

We were both getting disappointed but not to say that we weren't having a good time. I actually really enjoyed walking through the city of Toronto at nighttime. I would never go through the U of T campus or walk towards Queen's Park at that time of night without a reason and I really began to appreciate what the Toronto city landscape had to offer. The night was beautiful and the art I saw was the art of people coming together in a city at night to walk the city and engage through observation and experience. The art of people in a city environment was very beautiful for me.

We had a set goal to reach the "Crowd" installation at Queen's Park. I had marked it as a spot I really wanted to stop at when I read its description in the handbook. My friend assured me that that stop would be great and we would enjoy it and I would write about it (he senses these things quite well). We reached Queen's Park and saw a couple other installations before we hit my favourite part of the night: the "Crowd".

The night was about light. It was the technique of light, sound and space that I was looking to enjoy at Nuit Blanche and Kristan Hortan did a very well job of attracting my eyes, ears, full attention and engagement with his conceptual installation. Located at the south end of Queen's Park near College street, "Crowd" was what I would describe as an environmental sculpture designed like a stage / stadium structured with metal poles and illuminated by a number of positioned lights designed to encapsulate the essence of nature with light, camera, sound and people.
The official Nuit Blanche description of the installation was the following:

"“Crowd is an encounter of the alien. What is elsewhere is experienced here. What is “heard” is an orchestration of time and space. What is “seen” is the collective exposed within a colossal and immersive light environment. Crowd juxtaposes the stationary with the transitory, effectively setting the stage for a close encounter."

We found so much meaning, so much peace and so much power in Hortan’s piece that compelled us beyond our control to sit down and enjoy the experience in the park. I found it so interesting that the installation piece itself – as in the built physical element – wasn’t what drew people towards itself; it was the lighting, the trees, the loud speakers projecting sounds of music as if being performed on stage, and voices and sounds drawing connections to a certain experience – like a cockpit for example or happy whistling or even opera singing. It was about the atmosphere it created with the loud projection of sounds and music, amongst a stage of light that invited people to circle around and enjoy being a part of the piece, as if they were the essential elements for completion of the installation.

Horton is a widely recognized artist from Toronto who has had exhibitions around
the world:

“Kristan Horton was born in Canada in 1971. He studied at Guelph University and the Ontario College of Art and Design. He has had an international exhibition career since the late 1990's including Glassbox, Paris (FR), ZKM, Karlsruhe, Germany, Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland, Inter Communications Center, Tokyo.”

His sculptures have been recognized for creating a fourth dimension using time and space. NOW magazine credits his work for having such quality:
“Horton scores big points for pushing sculpture brilliantly into theoretical physics.”
In Contemporary magazine, Toronto writer and OCAD faculty member Ian Carr-Harris reflects on another installation of Horton’s as collapsing “natural cycle and mechanized ambition in a form of reveire on distance”.

Horton seems to really have a strong sensitivity on how to engage, captivate and reflect upon the connections between senses and environments using time and space as his tools for design. He sure opened my eyes and ears to new possibilities with installation art in public spaces.


Sources

Carr-Harris, Ian. “Kristan Horton”. Contemporary 2006 Annual. 2006:67.

Horton, Kristan. Official Website. 10 Oct. 2007 http://www.kristanhorton.com.

Temple, Kevin. “The physics of sculpture, Kristan Horton's brilliant work takes form into a new dimension.” Now Magazine. November 24-30.