Skip to main content

Advertisement

Advertisement

The light touch: Our top picks from i Light Marina Bay 2016

SINGAPORE — Feast your eyes on this: The fourth edition of the i Light Marina Bay festival kicks off this weekend, and its organisers have transformed the Marina Bay Waterfront into an interactive outdoor exhibition space with 25 sustainable light art installations.

SINGAPORE — Feast your eyes on this: The fourth edition of the i Light Marina Bay festival kicks off this weekend, and its organisers have transformed the Marina Bay Waterfront into an interactive outdoor exhibition space with 25 sustainable light art installations.

This year, the festival will feature artworks that have been designed based on the theme In Praise Of Shadows, which invites visitors to reimagine the fundamentals, forms and roles of light. More than half of the installations are designed by local artists and students, including Zulkifle Mahmod, Hafiz Osman as well as students from the National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore Polytechnic and Nanyang Polytechnic.

This year’s festival will also feature a whole slew of complementary events and activities, including an LED Kites Aerial Performance, where LED-lit kites fly in tandem to music, and a symposium that gathers thought leaders from the fields architecture, art and poetry to discuss the way they consider light in their practices. Visitors can also drop by the festival village, which will offer dining options from the likes of Harry’s, Haagen Dazs, Coffee Bandits, Kerbside Gourmet, The Travelling C.O.W. and Old Chang Kee, as well as PasarBella Goes To Town, which offers seafood, meat, dairy, fresh produce, wines and more.

i Light Marina Bay is organised by the Urban Redevelopment Authority and will be held annually from this year onwards. According to Randy Chan, co-curator of the festival and principal architect at Zarch Collaboratives, the third edition of the festival, held in 2014, attracted more than 700,000 visitors, and the team hopes to exceed that number this year.

“It is ambitious in terms of the programming,” Chan. “I call it a feast — you have musical performances and food. This time, we have over 40 activities. We have grown in confidence from our past experience, we are ready with the food, to bring in the music, and we have activated the whole Marina Bay. We have cultivated an audience quite carefully over the years.”

Feast your eyes on some of these installations.

i Light Marina Bay 2016 will be held until March 27 at Marina Bay. For more information about the festival, go to www.ilightmarinabay.sg.

***

1. WHAT A LOVING & BEAUTIFUL WORLD. Created by Japanese interdisciplinary artist collaborative teamLab, this installation invites visitors to log on to http://ilight.team-lab.com, swipe different Chinese characters from the website, and watch as the resulting images project themselves on the facade of the ArtScience Museum. The images can even interact with each other — for example, if you picked the word “bird”, you’ll someone else picked “thunder”, you’ll see a bird flying away in fright. Pretty cool, isn’t it?

2. SONICTOWER. Inspired by Lewis Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland and Spaces Speak, Are You Listening by Barry Blesser and Linda-Ruth Salter, this five-storey structure at The Float at Marina Bay, done by Singaporean artist ZUL (Zulkifle Mahmod) creates a rhythmic sound-and-lightscape within the scaffold using 320 solenoids and energy-saving LED lights. It’s a good reminder for those of us who always have our noses stuck in our phones to look up and observe the sights and sounds in our surroundings, if only just once in a while.

3. ANGELS OF FREEDOM. This installation by the OGE Group, Gaston Zahr and Merav Eitan from Germany and Israel, features five sets of giant colourful wings at The Promontory at Marina Bay. It is the perfect photo opportunity for snapchat and Instagram addicts.

4. CYCLE HOUSE. Located at the Lower Boardwork, near Bayfront South Jetty, this piece by Singaporean artist Hafiz Osman is a mobile workstation combining temporary shelter and cycling, and representing a wanderer’s quest for adventure. Most of all, however, it reminds us of that uncle who cycles around town with LED lights all over his bicycle.

5. BOLT. Created by Malaysian architect-artist Jun Ong, this work at the Marina Bay waterfront promenade comprises an intricate network of LED tubes that flare up when touched, mimicking the nature of lightning. Aside from its striking effects, Bolt also reminds us of the importance and satisfaction of re-connecting with the physical world.

6. MOON HAZE. Designed by Chinese artists Feng Jiacheng and Huang Yuanbei, the installation, which is situation at the Marina Bay waterfront promenande, represents the full moon, and brightens and darkens according to the ambient air quality. Guess it’ll be good to have this installation around come haze season?

***

HOW TO EXPLORE I LIGHT MARINA BAY 2016

ON FOOT: If you wish to get up close to every installation, this is probably the best way. But be warned: according to the organisers, a full walking tour will take more than three hours, as the route stretches over 3.5 kilometres. Be sure to download VoiceMap on the Apple App Store or Google Play for a free audio guide with voice prompts that are triggered by GPS when you arrive at each installation.

BY BOAT: If a three-hour tour sounds too much to bear, the Singapore River Cruise is also offering daily boat shuttles for visitors to view the light art installations from the waters. The Tale Of 2 Quays tour lasts 40 minutes, and costs S$25 per adult and S$15 per child. Visit http://www.rivercruise.com.sg for more details.

ON A NINEBOT MOBILITY DEVICE: If legs and boats sound too mainstream for you, you may wish to try gliding. Ninebot Asia is offering a guided tour of the light art installations on their Mobility Devices. For S$28, visitors can choose between The Promontory route or The Helix route. Bookings can be made online on the festival website.

Read more of the latest in

Advertisement

Advertisement

Stay in the know. Anytime. Anywhere.

Subscribe to get daily news updates, insights and must reads delivered straight to your inbox.

By clicking subscribe, I agree for my personal data to be used to send me TODAY newsletters, promotional offers and for research and analysis.