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Photos: Lee Towndrow and Ryan Calvelo

Ballroom Dancing
Featuring students from Parkdale Public School and and teacher Amanda Biber

Ballroom Dancing was an all-ages dance party during Toronto's 2006 Nuit Blanche. It was deejayed by kids from Parkdale Public School in a gymnasium filled with over 2700 rubber balls. Ballroom Dancing brought adults and children together to dance to tunes selected and controlled by the kids. A safe playtime was fostered in order to counter the prevailing view that the public sphere is a place of danger, atomization and awkwardness rather than safety, communication and stylin' moves. Later in the evening, the safe playtime was usurped by the adults who insisted on a massive game of murderball where they managed to generate ten eye injuries, a number of broken glasses, a fat lip, a dislocated knee and a broken scaphoid - the most litigated bone in the body. The National Post called it "the unanimous favourite."

Music was selected by kids from Parkdale Public School, deejay training by Rosina Kazi and Nicholas Murray and light designed by Rebecca Picherack.

Ballroom Dancing and Nuit Blance happened from sunset at 7:01 p.m. on September 30 to sunrise at 7:15 a.m. on October 1, 2006 at University Settlement House, 23 Grange Road, just south of OCAD.

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