For all the talk of late night boozing, 24 hour subway service, and survival, it's easy to forget what Toronto's Nuit Blanche is really all about: giant floating rabbits. That, and free, accessible contemporary art. With 46 installations, 132 total projects, and over 280 artists (official and renegade), deciding what to see can be a daunting task. More likely than not, your more memorable art pieces will be the ones you accidentally stumble upon at 4 in the morning. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't have a plan. Here are some of the more interesting pieces at this year's Nuit Blanche.

Rabbit Balloon, Jeff Koons, Eaton's Centre
Yonge and Dundas is always one of Nuit Blanche's more heavily trafficked areas, and so it's perfectly suited to something big and flashy. Jeff Koons' 50-foot mirrored stainless-steel rabbit will surely catch the eye of at least a few Nuit Blanchers, and may even cause a few to ruminate on the gaudily empty spectacle of Toronto's Times Square-lite. Maybe.

Battle Royal, Shaun El C. Leonardo, Toronto Coach Terminal
If you've ever witnessed a fight between hobos at the bus terminal and thought "boy, someone should really erect a 17' steel cage around them and call it art," then you're in luck. A recreation of the opening scene of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, Battle Royal pits 20 of Canada's elite wrestlers and fighters against each other, Shaun "El Conquistador" Leonardo (the artist himself), and blindfolded members of the audience for what could very well be the ballsiest piece at Nuit Blanche.

Art Moves, The Other Gallery, Various Venues
Exploring the relationship between inspiration, interpretation, and creation, The Other Gallery's Paul Butler has invited thirty members of his artistic community to each ask another person to describe their reaction to a work of art that has made an impact on them. The text-based results will be on display at 24-hour convenience stores across downtown Toronto. For a taste of the project, we asked Canadian filmmaker Guy Maddin to share his contribution with us. His response can be found here.

Space Becomes The Instrument, Gordon Monahan, Massey Hall
Ontario/Germany-based artist Gordon Monahan will open the doors to Toronto's most hallowed and majestic concert hall, Massey Hall, and turned it on its head. Thirty-metre-long piano wires will be suspended across the interior of the venue, turning the balconies and seating areas into the de facto performing area. Musicians will change harmonics by pulling electric coils along the strings while audience members will observe from the stage. If nothing else, this affords a great opportunity to stand on the iconic stage that Neil Young once made famous.

Pwn the Wall, Graffiti Research Lab, 518 Bay Street
Using a new device called "bombIR", an infared-LED spray can be used to "paint" with light, writers will attempt to reference revolutionary 1930's agitprop images with virtual graffiti art on the side of a building on Bay Street. Since it's all city-sponsored and transitory, it hardly has the same impact as the original movements, but I'm sure it'll at least look pretty.

Dead Philosophers' Limbo, Susan Burpee, Court House
To paraphrase Elvis Costello, writing about art is like dancing about philosophy. Susan Burpee aims to bring this butchered epithet to life with a twelve-hour dance "choreographed" to Simon Critchley's The Book of Dead Philosophers. This Saturday, twenty-four dancers will perform and two hundred philosophers will die. How's that for a tagline?

Beautiful Light: Four Letter Word Machine, D.A. Therrien, Toronto City Hall
This just seems like a disaster waiting to happen. D.A. Therrien's piece suspends four 7 metre square alphanumeric lamps that will randomly display letters, sequences, and bits of code between the two towers of Toronto City Hall for the world to see. Running all night long, the machine is capable of displaying nearly 4.94 billion distinct combinations. If a million monkeys at a million typewriters can type the works of Shakespeare, imagine what kind of profanity this little four letter word machine might be capable of.

Fire and Sausage: Small Mercies, Tom Dean, Liberty Village
One of many recession-themed art pieces this year (second only to "social networking" in Nuit Blanche ubiquity), Fire and Sausage imagines a post-apocalyptic (at least financial-apocalyptic) world in which we have returned to the supposed universal ideals of tenderness and social generosity. Participants (i.e. you) will congregate around a fire and bask in the warmth of Jamie Kennedy's sausage. Wait, maybe I should explain that. Kennedy, a man who's seen his own capital shrink of late, will be cooking up sausages on an open fire and serving up hot chocolate from a giant cauldron.

Fire The Sight of Sound, The Drake Hotel
The Drake Hotel knows its clientele well. The hipster hotbed will be going all out for Nuit Blanche in a multi-disciplinary event called The Sight of Sound. For starters, in a piece called Urban Echo, audiences can text and twitter messages onto the front of the building, before exploding and scattering. Meanwhile in the General Store, regular merchandise will be cleared out to make way for $5 and $10 "surprise" loot bags, but the real prize will be free original take-away artwork by Guy Maddin (hopefully not the saddest paintings in the world).

Vodka Pool, Dan Mihaltianu, Commerce Court West
Of all the tenuous connections to the financial crisis under the guise of "meaning", I think this one takes the cake. Vodka Pool is exactly what its name suggests – a reflecting pool of alcohol in the atrium of Commerce Court West. I'll refer you to the statement in the program for optimal eye-rolling pretentiousness: "Liquor and liquidity bear more than passing associations to banks and money. Intoxicating, like the euphoria of riches; evaporating, like the vanishing of investments during economic downturns." Read this and you'll be reaching for your own flask of vodka. – R.T.