Lighting Up The UK’s Highest Mountains
Ben Nevis, Scotland © Lucy Hamilton
Outdoor art project Green Space Dark Skies invited 20,000 people to take part in mass gatherings in some of the UK’s most beautiful landscapes. Volunteers known as Luminators used low-impact lights to create spectacular visual displays at dusk, celebrating nature, our responsibility to protect it and everyone’s right to explore the countryside. The project was commissioned by UNBOXED: Creativity in the UK, led by outdoor arts experts Walk the Plank and with BASE Collective member Rupert Shanks as Director of the camera team.
The finale of the project involved lighting up the UK’s four highest mountains – Scafell Pike in England, Ben Nevis in Scotland, Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon) in Wales and Slieve Donard in Northern Ireland – and featured in a BBC Countryfile special at the weekend. Each illumination has been documented in a short film, and you can watch the final instalment below.
© Phil Smyth
© Geraint Thomas
20 events took place in UK wild spaces between April and September this year, including seven National Parks and a number of Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs). Locations were kept a secret and only disclosed to those who had signed up to take part in order to protect and minimise the impact of footfall on them.
The project aims to encourage participants and those inspired by the results to share their stories of connection with the countryside, creating a national dialogue about our rights, responsibilities and relationship with nature and landscapes.
A core aim of the project is to explore the access barriers to access green and blue spaces that some groups in society face – updating the discourse sparked by the Kinder Scout Trespass in 1932.
Green Space Dark Skies is a carbon positive project, ultimately removing more carbon from the atmosphere than it produced and aiming to empower those involved to make a difference locally and to become caretakers of nature for the future.
Luminators rehearse before dark. © Lucy Hamilton
© David Bewick
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