Field of Light Inspiration
The idea was originally conceived in 1992 during a trip through central Australia. The red desert had an incredible feeling of energy; ideas seemed to radiate from it along with the heat. The Field of Light (FOL) installation was one idea that landed in my sketch book and kept on nagging at me…it just had to be done.
Travelling along the Stewart Highway, aside from brief fuel, food and beverage stops in the day, one tends to pull off the road at dusk, moving on again at sunrise. Often, the campsites are a total contrast to the barren red desert that surrounds them; green oases doused at dusk by the stammer of Artesian-fed sprinklers. Each campsite displayed a larger than life sculpture/sign of surreal design and proportion; the big pineapple, banana and the Marino sheep!
The inspiration for the FOL can therefore be attributed to many factors. Light has always played a major part in my life and work and, therefore for me, it is a natural medium to use. Deserts have many incongruities, they are infertile, barren places, until it rains and then they bloom like a veritable Eden. I wanted to create a field of light stems that, like the dormant seed in a dry desert, would quietly wait until darkness falls and then under a blazing blanket of southern stars bloom with gentle rhythms of light. Ones attention is thus drawn to the nature that surrounds the installation as well as the FOL itself.
By placing an alien installation in the midst of nature, the enormous contrast created allows one to literally see the wood from the trees and that has always been the focus since the idea germinated fifteen years ago. Over this time the design format and technology have evolved along with the place that the first field of light will be sown…
Under the shadow of an ancient hill in southwest England, in a field of clover bisected by a public footpath, the FOL shimmered its way through the seasons presenting a myriad of opportunities for passersby to catch glimpses of nature’s guises. I am hopeful that it will inspire both young and old to take from it and create something of their own to pass on in turn to others.
In recent years, I have had many more ideas about the meaning of the field and an equal number of ways to express these thoughts…but my instinct tells me that that’s not what I am meant to do, other than say that the FOL is a personal symbol for the good things in life. My job is to make it happen and inspire those around me to join in on the project. I hope that it will gather its own momentum and like the proverbial snowball take on a life of its own when it reaches a critical mass.