The dark first weekend of November will be a bright one for Whitley Bay, as artists and artists' groups use light to create works of art to illuminate the seafront in "Shimmer". Northerner arts illuminator Alan Sykes reports.
Shimmer, now in its second year, is the result of a nationally advertised call out for artists to come up with imaginative proposals for installations and performances using light. With Jupiter rising brightly in the east at dusk, and a waning gibbous moon, nature should be lending a hand as well.
Artist partnership Aether & Hemera (named after the Greek god and goddess of bright upper air and daylight), otherwise Italians Gloria Ronchi and Claudio Benghi, who moved to the North East from Milan in 2008, have created Rainbow Glowing Wheels, a series of kinetic digital Catherine-wheels that will be placed along the seafront. These are inspired by Spanish City's Rainbow Wheel fairground ride of 1913, one of the attractions that made Whitley Bay one of the country's most popular seaside resorts in its heyday.
According to its prospectus the original Rainbow Wheel was "a strikingly large and attractively built steel wheel, 90ft high by 12ft wide" with six narrow gauge railway carriages which would take their passengers:
dashing headlong into Dante's Fearful Inferno amid a tumult of mechanically-produced noises and thunder, weird, unearthly and uncanny screams, and the flames and fires of Hades (produced electrically), out of which the cars presently shoot again into the glorious open, imparting to the passengers a momentary impression of the brightness of the world outside contrasted with the horrible regions below, only to be shot once more into that fearful, blazing abyss "Beyond Redemption."
It promised it
fascinates, thrills, and exhilarates, and all the while provokes the pleasingly puzzled passengers into fits of hilarious laughter as they fail to understand and enter into the spirit of this delightful perplexity, a new sensation which is bound to become a "screaming success".
Colin Priest's Flash Fog is a recreation of "haar", or sea fret, with movement sensors triggered by passers-by setting off lights and fog horns. Concrete Waves is an installation-cum-performance by RealTyne, which mixes a skateboarding performance with projections of surfers and skateboarders. Novak Collective will present Diversión, an animated video that uses the dome and façade of Spanish City as its "screen".
Worldbeaters Music has created Spark! specially for Shimmer. It will take the form of a choreographed performance by seven musicians dressed in striking white costumes decked in flashing lights carrying their illuminated (and extremely loud) drums -
These glittering and illuminated forms will take the audience on a colour-filled, dreamlike journey around the Links and will appear in some unexpected places
Cllr George Westwater, North Tyneside Council's cabinet member for Community and Regulatory Services, said:
North Tyneside's coast is a jewel in the north east crown, and is now firmly established as a great place to see some of the best contemporary art around. The Council is delighted to be presenting Shimmer again this year, bringing specially-commissioned, accessible artworks to Whitley Bay.
North Tyneside is building something of a reputation for itself as a home for experimental light and projection art. Earlier this year Yvette Mattern's Global Rainbow kicked off the Cultural Olympiad in the North East and could be seen 40 miles away, while Kelly Richardson's video installation Mariner 9 and the Whitley Bay Film Festival also attracted large audiences.
Shimmer is on at the seafront at Whitley Bay from 5-8.30pm this weekend, Saturday and Sunday 3-4 November.
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