Concordia students team up with the NFB on interactive Nuit blanche installation
Clockwise from top left: Marcon Meneghin, Marie Matraire, Charlie McClure and Sarah Bastien.
Concordia students are bringing archival footage to life in a new interactive installation at the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) for this year’s Nuit blanche, an overnight art festival. Part of the Festival Montréal en Lumière, the Feb. 28 event features more than 100 activities citywide.
The students’ installation, “Archives : remixage / Re:Archive,” is a special collaboration between Concordia’s Faculty of Fine Arts, doctoral and graduate students in Film and Moving Images Studies, the Curatorial Studies and Practices certificate program, and the NFB. Music students from the Faculty of Music at the Université de Montréal will score the project.
The project is designed to offer visitors a hands-on way to remix archival footage, experiment with images in real time, and co-create new stories in a collaborative, interactive space.
An opportunity to experiment
The collaborative team includes Concordia students Charlie Galea-McClure, Sarah Bastien, Marco Meneghin and Marie Martraire. They began working on the project in December 2025, refining the concept through multiple iterations into an interactive experience that balances creativity, technical and analogue exploration, and audience participation.
“We are inviting participants to actively play with archival content. Within the space, the audience will edit and re-mix NFB material, not only to engage with NFB history, but to reimagine the past and tell new stories,” explains Bastien, a Curatorial Studies and Practices student.
She says “Re:Archive” is intended to function as an open studio, where experimentation is not only welcomed, but central to the project. As beginner curators, she and her collaborators have valued the chance to explore new approaches while bringing an idea from conception to realization.
“I grew up watching NFB films and attending their public events. It feels quite special to be given the opportunity to collaborate with such an iconic institution, especially as curators,” adds Galea-McClure (Film Animation, 25), also a Curatorial Studies student.
Martraire, a PhD student in Film and Moving Image Studies, agrees.
“Working hands-on with the NFB archives was a particularly meaningful experience for us. Seeing these films move beyond the archive and into a shared, playful space is incredibly rewarding, as audiences begin to shape the films themselves,” she says.
“Watching people step into the role of editors and storytellers shows how archival images can take on new lives in the present," adds Meneghin, PhD student in Film and Moving Image Studies. "Archives are not only about preservation, but also transmission and collective creativity.”
A hands-on creative playground
Visitors can assemble and manipulate images in real time to create a shared storyboard on a massive digital wall, while each five-minute session is projected live as a short film on surrounding walls. Another video zone is dedicated to soundtrack creation, where Université de Montréal musicians remix and compose music for the films, also in real time.
Live looping films and interactive visuals complete the immersive environment, blending education, art and technology.
“We were thrilled to collaborate with Concordia on Nuit blanche,” says Anne-Claire Lefaivre, general director of programming and audience engagement at the NFB.
“These young art- and film lovers’ fresh perspectives complement our expertise and knowledge, resulting in a participatory experience that we can’t wait to share with audiences of all ages,” she said.
Where: NFB Space, National Film Board of Canada, 1501 Bleury Road, Montreal
When: February 28, part of Nuit blanche à Montréal, Festival Montréal en Lumière
Learn more about “Archives : remixage / Re:Archive.”
Learn more about Concordia’s Curatorial Studies and Practices and Film and Moving Images Studies programs.
