Light Drift

LIGHT DRIFT, a collaboration between the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and artist J. Meejin Yoon, placed a temporary interactive lighting installation along Schuylkill Banks between Market and Chestnut Streets from October 15-17, 2010. The project created a field of lighting elements that drew viewers into a playful engagement with the artwork, the river, and each other.

The lighting elements are shaped like orbs or buoys and are equipped with electronics that allow them to respond to a viewer and to communicate with each other. The orbs on land use sensors to detect the presence of a person and relay a radio signal to the corresponding orbs in the water, allowing visitors to transform the lighting behavior and color of the orbs in the river.

As viewers engage and occupy the orbs along the park, the grid of lights in the water becomes an index of the activities on land. Multiple viewers can create intersections of linear patterns, encouraging viewers to “play” with each other. These orbs bring the community together by providing gathering spaces for watching the river turn into a flickering constellation, creating new connections on the river’s edge.