The Field of Light is a large-scale site-specific light-based installation created by British artist

Bruce Munro Bruce Beaton St Clair Munro (born 2 June 1959) is a dual nationality English/Australian artist known for producing large immersive site-specific installations, often by massing components in the thousands. Frequently, Munro's subject matter is h ...

. It has been staged in many different locations around the world. The sculpture slowly changes colour, creating a shimmering field of light.

History

Field of Light was originally conceived in 1992, when Munro took a farewell road trip through central Australia with his fiancée (now wife), prior to their return to England, camping at Uluru/Ayers Rock. To Munro, the red desert had an incredible feeling of energy, ideas seemed to radiate from it along with the heat. "There was a charge in the air that gave me a very immediate feeling which I didn't fully understand, the artist said, "It was a moment when I felt at one with the world....I recorded thoughts of creating a sculpture on a landscape scale, incongruous in size and location, and experienced by the transient visitors...I saw in my mind a landscape of illuminated stems that, like dormant seeds in a dry desert, quietly wait until darkness falls, under a blazing blanket of southern stars, to bloom with gentle rhythms of light." The Field of Light installation was one idea that landed in the artist's sketch book and refused to dislodge from his mind, until finally realized for the first time in 2004.' FieldoflightUluru

Munro made his first prototype Field of Light for London's

Harvey Nichols Harvey Nichols Group Limited ( trading as Harvey Nichols) is a British luxury department store chain founded in 1831 by Benjamin Harvey; it is headquartered at its flagship store in Knightsbridge, London. It sells designer fashion collections ...

department store. Shortly after Field of Light was exhibited at the ''Brilliant!'' Exhibition at the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (abbreviated V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.8 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen ...

in 2004, Munro developed a larger version of the installation for Long Knoll Field in Wiltshire –a field adjacent to his studio that is bisected by a public footpath. Subsequently, Munro has continued to produce site-specific iterations of the artwork in a number of places, often as one element among many within a large solo exhibition.

List of installation sites

The Field of Light has been installed at: *

Eden Project The Eden Project () is a visitor attraction in Cornwall, England. The project is located in a reclaimed china clay clay pit, pit.Ordnance Survey (2005). ''OS Explorer Map 107 – Fowey, Looe & Lostwithiel''. . The complex is dominated by two h ...

, Cornwall, England. 2008–2009. *

Holburne Museum The Holburne Museum (formerly known as the Holburne of Menstrie Museum and the Holburne Museum of Art) is located in Sydney Pleasure Gardens, Bath, Somerset, England. The city's first public art gallery, the Grade I listed building, is home to ...

, Bath, England. 2011–2012. *

Longwood Gardens Longwood Gardens is a public garden that consists of more than 1,100 acres (445 hectares; 4.45 km2) of gardens, woodlands, and meadows in the Brandywine Creek Valley in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, United States. It is one of the premier ...

, Kennet Square, Pennsylvania, United States. (Forest of Light and Field of Light) June–October 2012. *

Waddesdon Manor Waddesdon Manor is a English country house, country house in the village of Waddesdon, in Buckinghamshire, England. Owned by the National Trust and managed by the Rothschild Foundation, it is one of the National Trust's most visited properties, ...

, the

Rothschild Rothschild () is a name derived from the German ''zum rothen Schild'' (with the old spelling "th"), meaning "to the red shield", in reference to the houses where these family members lived or had lived. At the time, houses were designated by signs ...

Collection, Aylesbury, England. (River of Light, and Field of Light) Annual Exhibition Residency, 2012-2015 * Cheekwood Botanical Gardens and Museum of Art, Nashville, Tennessee, United States. May–November 2013 *

Franklin Park Conservatory Franklin Park Conservatory and Botanical Gardens is a botanical garden and conservatory located in Columbus, Ohio. It is open daily and an admission fee is charged. Today, it is a horticultural and educational institution showcasing exotic plan ...

, Columbus, Ohio, United States. October-2013-March 2014 * St Andrews Square, Edinburgh, Scotland. Commissioned by the City of Edinburgh Council. February–April 2014 *

Parque Lincoln Parque Lincoln is a city park in Mexico City, Mexico in the Polanco neighborhood. The park memorializes US President Abraham Lincoln and has a copy of '' Abraham Lincoln: The Man'', also known as ''Standing Lincoln''. The park also has a st ...

, Simbionte Festival, Mexico City, Mexico. April 2014 *

Discovery Green Discovery Green is an public urban park in Downtown Houston, Texas, bounded by La Branch Street to the west, McKinney Street to the north, Avenida de las Americas to the east, and Lamar Street to the south. The park is adjacent to the George ...

, Houston, Texas, United States. November. Commissioned by Discovery Green Conservancy. 2014–February 2015 and November 2015–February 2016. *

Atlanta Botanical Garden The Atlanta Botanical Garden is a botanical garden located adjacent to Piedmont Park in Midtown Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Incorporated in 1976, the garden's mission is to "develop and maintain plant collections for the purposes of displ ...

, (Forest of Light) Atlanta, Georgia, United States. April–October 2015 *

Desert Botanical Garden Desert Botanical Garden is a botanical garden located in Papago Park, at 1201 N. Galvin Parkway in Phoenix, central Arizona. Founded by the Arizona Cactus and Native Flora Society in 1937 and established at this site in 1939, the garden now ...

, Phoenix, Arizona, United States. November 2015-May 2016 *

Uluru Uluru (; ), also known as Ayers Rock ( ) and officially gazetted as UluruAyers Rock, is a large sandstone monolith. It outcrop, crops out near the centre of Australia in the southern part of the Northern Territory, south-west of Alice Spri ...

, Yulara Drive, Northern Territory, Australia. March 2016 - ongoing. FieldofLightSouthernCross

, the

Collection, Aylesbury, England. November 2016-January 2017 *Nicholas Conservatory and Gardens, Rockford, Illinois, United States. June 2017-November 2017 * Avenue of honour, Mount Clarence, Albany, Western Australia. October 2018 - April 2019 *Sensorio, Paso Robles, California, United States. May 18, 2019 - ongoing. *

Brookgreen Gardens Brookgreen Gardens is a sculpture garden and wildlife preserve, located just south of Murrells Inlet, in the U.S. state of South Carolina. The property includes several themed gardens featuring American figurative sculptures, the Lowcountry Zo ...

, Murrels Inlet, South Carolina, United States. April 4 - September 12, 2020. *Freedom Plaza, New York, New York, United States, December 2023 - November 2024.

References

External links

fieldoflight.co.uk
— Field of Light page, Bruce Munro website *https://web.archive.org/web/20150928162007/http://light.longwoodgardens.org/light/installations/field-of-light-Longwood Gardens Light: Installations by Bruce Munro website *https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcY6AoJJEhY Bruce Munro: Winter Light, Waddesdon Manor, 2013 *Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek's Aha Moment at 'Field of Light'https://www.wsj.com/video/nobel-laureate-frank-wilczek-aha-moment-at-field-of-light/3404331D-ED39-41DC-8189-D00C39B2361B.html *A guide t
Paso Robles Lights
Light At Sensorio {{DEFAULTSORT:Field Of Light 2004 sculptures Contemporary works of art Light art Uluru