It’s back again! Two years ago, I was only vaguely aware of it; one year ago, I was truly aware of it and managed to see some of the installations; and now, we mean to do it properly. There’s an abortive attempt the night before but Saturday at 8pm is, it turns out, not the quitest time to do this and it becomes apparent to me very quickly that I’m not going to enjoy the experience. So I return the next night to try again.
I didn’t manage to do all of them. I was up against it time-wise, and the queue for Ascendance was ridiculous, whilst Bristol Is Always A Good Idea was just a bit too far away. And, to be honest, a lot of the ones I went to were diminished by, to be honest, the general public being the general public. People hogging the exhibits (like the wonderful Nectary, neon glowing flowers that you could stand under), people being disruptive, all that kind of thing.
The swings are back as ever, and obviously rainbow colours are quite the vibe in general, but I did wonder if there were some other pride flag line-ups flickering through the cycles.
Some were more underwhelming than others. Wildlight, on Finzel’s Reach, didn’t really feel like anything other than a big video projection. But a lot of the others were very fun to look at and, yes, #grammable.
I was mostly struck, though, by how much they would have been improved with Alasdair there. It’s nice and all taking good photos of light installations in a vacuum, but taking photos of someone in front of them is even nicer. Especially when some of them, like the multi-reflective Emergence, practically require it. Maybe next year.