Nerd Alert: Faerie Light Tech
The amazing tech behind my favorite art exhibit EVER: North Forest Lights
Previously: What is the North Forest Lights?
Or should I say…what was it?
Because it’s gone now, never to return. In 2021, after three winters running, Crystal Bridges decided to close North Forest Lights. Foreverrrrrrrrrrrr.
Ahem. I'll be okay.
Sorta.
Someday.
I get this way about my favorite art. You remember the snivelly state I'm thrown into for weeks every time I finish the last page of my favorite book series, right? The state of depression I experience is ri-goddam-diculous. Sometimes the only way to assuage it is by creating a music playlist that I obsessively listen to hour after hour until it finally abates. Sometimes I have to make dances about it. Other times, there is only one thing I can do.
The SYFY series Magicians sums it up:
Julia: I had a friend who used to do that. Once he got to the end of his favorite book, he’d go back to the beginning again.
Young Quentin: Endings are the worst part. Characters grow up, they move on. Some of them die. It feels like—
Julia: Your best friend in the whole world’s abandoned you.
This was the state I was in shortly after the North Forest Lights exhibit ended, because I had also just torn through my favorite fantasy series for the...well, it was my sixth time for Book 1. It was the third time for Book 2. We're still waiting for Book 3 after more than a decade, and reading the amazing sidetrack novella only makes things 999 times worse. If you've been waiting along with us then you know my pain.
Honestly, I'm afraid to ever read "The End" of this series because then I'll probably be so depressed that I'll have to go back like I did the first time and start at Page 1 all over again and then one more time and I'll never be able to read anything else for the whole rest of my darn life!
I digress.
But not really. Because knowing that there would never again be faerie lights in the North Forest only splatted the ice cream onto the concrete of my already pouty, mopey post-book depression.
So I binged my ginormous Kvothe Kingkiller playlist day and night. I watched the videos I'd made of the North Forest Lights. I danced obsessively to them all, and consumed ice cream in winter.
The only other thing I could think to do with my preposterous butt was to hie myself back to the North Forest on the off chance that some residue of that magical Fae Realm still lingered to provide a bit of wound-lickery.
To my shock, there was way more than residue.
As I strolled the trails again, this time by daylight, at first I was merely struck by nostalgia and a different view of this place that had brought me so much joy and inspiration. Rather than the flashes of neon against a black canvas and the cool LED tones in the chilly night air, the late afternoon forest was warm. Soft. Hushed. The only music came from birdsong or the rustle of tiny feet scurrying through the husks of leaves, and the sun was just beginning to set upon the reminders of fall still clinging to the trees. (The beech and oaks don't shed their leaves here until the spring.) To top it off, the moon in the pale blue sky was half-full.
Half-empty?
I don't mind half-empty. It means there is plenty of room for something new.
The bittersweetness of this day was just another of my adventures stalking death and sunbeams with my camera. As a devotee of Persephone and Haides, and as one who has danced upon the fringes of death multiple times, I do that a lot.
This sunset stroll let me say goodbye to the lights more tenderly, more intimately than my grandiose farewell hurrah when I had attended the exhibit amidst hundreds of other people for the RebirthDay I share with the Unconquerable Sun (a.k.a. the northern hemisphere’s Winter Solstice). This afternoon, I mostly had the forest to myself.
It always begins with the long walk in.
The naked winter trees, the meandering trail, a smattering of art. In daylight, the familiar installations of the permanent collection could now be admired in better detail. The speakers for the musical soundtrack were still up, casting manmade black silhouettes against the sky amongst the natural shapes of the branches. Tucked into crevices beside those trees that had been singled out for solitary illumination, the pipes for the fog effects were still camouflaged amongst the roots, rocks, and leaves.
To my left, the Fly's Eye Dome, created by the same artist who made our beloved Buckyball, peeked through the gold-kissed forest on the far side of the ravine, beckoning me to come play with it. A few days later, I did. I'll show you what else I discovered that day, but for now, let's stick with the North Forest while they were dismantling Moment Factory's spectacular-spectacular.
After the long, subdued, contemplative walk in, I came to the remnants of the first installation. You remember the Crystal Grove? That ethereal faerie realm haunted by innumerable will-o-wisps and the miniature Wild Hunt that rushed across the ground between the trees. The miniature lightbulbs still dotted the ground, so I got to explore them up close. Now, instead of random lights blinking on and winking out, or dancing across the misty lawn, a whole field of marbles stared up at me, tracking my passage on their anemone stalks.
Next, came Forest Frequencies, the pounding visual orchestra of light bars dancing to the five-part heavy-metal caravan. To my delight, some of the bars still faintly glowed in the sunlight, and I got to scrutinize the electronic bits that had allowed them to sync with the music.
With the North Forest emptied, there was no long line for the Whispering Tree, but She did still whisper, if you had ears to hear. Neither was She barricaded off from intimate approach, so I finally got to meet Her up close for the first time.
Ohhhhhhhh, Earth Mama.
I was bummed that they had taken down the voice-analyzing microphone and the myriad moon-globes lodged in Her branches. But SHE isn't going anywhere. So I communed with Her (something I do every time I visit the North Forest now). I got to ask Her, touch Her, lean on Her, hug Her, listen to Her, purr to Her, and lie down beneath Her magnificence. Our conversations were very different from when we had sung together.
Yet it was exactly the same.
The Hearth was the exhibit that still had the most visible tech remaining, as well as all its groovy camouflaging. On the four corners of the clearing, big black eyeballs stared down upon me—the ballyhoo lights that had shone beacons into the night sky and bounded arcs among the trees.
When I was lured back a few days later, they'd dismantled all the ballyhoo lights as well as the outer shell of the Hearth itself, letting us admire its metal guts. Ooooh-la-la...
But on that first day, the sunlight lit up its heart oh-so nicely just for meeeee! As I shifted to take different shots, it flickered as though it was once again illuminated from within. The Golden Sun sculpture had done that, too, as well as the domes of the Snow Global Village.
As always, more of the permanent art collection and the forest's (im)permanent collection wooed me on the way to the final installation.
Alas, I couldn't get very close to the tech behind Memories of Water. The hillsides where the Blue Faerie Brigade came rushing down and where all those starbursts shone up at us were fenced off with "Danger, Will Robinson" posted all around. But we certainly got some fabulous beams shining down upon that bridge from a very different light source. No glowworms though.
Except for me, wriggling in exuberant glee as I nerded out with my camera and my goggling eyes.
All Hail the Tech!
For anybody who can’t hear my Ode to the Tech in the video, I wrote it out for you below.
Did you see them, buried in there amongst the winter forest pretties or standing out starkly against the blues and golds of the sky? The speakers and the cords, the dry ice pipes and—yes. Mr. Squirrel.
My nostalgic, nerdy love of All Things Tech
Said to me by multiple people after this adventure: “Ummm…you did what the other day? You—you took a bunch of photos of the North Forest Lights, in daylight, when it was half-dismantled so they couldn’t even turn it on? And then you spent hours making a video about it…”
Shifting eyes…
Scrunched up nose…
Furrowed brow…
“Why?”
You remember that my original major in college was Theater, right? Although my emphasis was in acting, I have often felt more at home among Tech Crew, especially when backstage is rife with cutthroat performers and catty cliques. It’s always been this way. The majority of my closest college friends and roommates were costumers, set designers, lighting geeks, and stage crew nerds on track to direct some day.
I also have the knack for that kind of stuff, and a personal interest in each area, so when I changed majors, I could have just as easily switched my theater emphasis to Tech instead of dropping the entire field of study.
We’ll get into why I didn’t another time. Suffice to say that if I'd been able to connect with any of the Theater Department tech instructors the way I did with every one of my History professors, I probably could have been happy in any of the Techie disciplines while keeping Dance and History as my minors, and belly dance as my passion.
Instead, I graduated with degrees in History, which I use every single time I write, and Dance, which became my profession for over thirty years. Rest assured, all those theater courses I took and my two decades as a young actress got constantly put to use in my career as well.
I was a director and producer for many years, and I must not have sucked at it, because the only time we didn't sell out our theater was when we split into a two-day show after turning away too many people. Then we merely had two nice, plump houses.
I also build costumes, and I always wished we'd had more makeup and hair instruction than we received in the general theater curriculum.
Then there’s lighting and sound. Y'all know how I am about lights and sound.
Ohhhhhh, lights...
Glorious music...
Ahem, and sound effects.
Seriously. Sometimes I think I should have become a Foley artist. Or a lighting designer. Or one of those people charged with finding the right song for the right scene, because I’m as obsessed with lights and sound as I am with color. And texture. And textiles. And touch…
(Okay, now we’re really starting to dive into Hyperfixator’s Haven.)
As for set design, I place objects and then move them half-an-inch or half-a-foot or into a completely different room or out of my house because they tell me they don't belong there. One of the many reasons why I resonate with Auri so much.
Oh, you don’t know who Auri is? I’ve already written about Patrick Rothfuss’ reclusive little MoonFae with hair like a golden corona. (See below.) She lives underground, decorating the old mechanical guts of a long-buried city with her pretty trinkets while tending and mending broken things. I dance her. I sing her. I first read her novella and started creating her costumes as I made these videos and wrote these posts. Due to that timing and all the Fae undertones of the North Forest Lights, that LED extravaganza and my faevorite fantasy book series are eternally intertwined in my heart and mind.
As the final sunflares vanished behind the hills, I made my exit from the North Forest like before, exhilarated and mournful. Inspired and more than a little choked up. Also, like the last time I had walked those trails, my phone ran out of juice right at the end of it. I did get to capture The Buckster by sunset though. With—yes—the hint of a massive crane in the background. Woot!
Thank you, Crystal Bridges.
Thank you, Moment Factory.
You gifted us with a wonder I will never forget!
New to the Alchemist’s Lab? Are you curious to go on the whole adventure and explore the North Forest Lights with me from the beginning?
Crystal Grove - the 1st installation
Forest Frequencies - the 2nd installation
Whispering Tree - the 3rd installation
The Hearth - the 4th installation
Memory of Water - the 5th and final installation
CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE & GEEKY LINKS - I toldja, “Lab” is also short for Labyrinth around here:
Moment Factory
Crystal Bridges
What is Crystal Bridges? My home away from home.
The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss - first book of the Kingkiller Chronicle. The only book I have ever read six bloody times. Don’t get attached. Seriously! Or do, and come enjoy the agony with us.
I wrote about this obsession and the huge dance project it spawned HERE.
Nooo…I don’t resonate with Auri at all. Hahaha!
My ginormous Kingkiller Kvothing Playlist - my substitute for the fact that we have no TV show, no movies, no soundtrack, and no Book 3 yet.
My RebirthDay is Winter Solstice - the anniversary of the night I was rammed by a drunk driver. This is one of the main reasons why we stalk Death & Sunbeams with the camera around here. To always remember how intimately entwined death is with life, and how intimately entwined rebirth is with death. Other reasons:
—I almost drowned when I was 4.
—That time I almost died in a tornado—I once had 9 months of chronic death dreams that reminded me that I don’t have as much time as I think I do. Do any of us?
—This is such an important subject to me that I wrote a whole fantasy series about it.
For anybody who can’t hear my Ode to the Tech in the video, I wrote it out for you:
I've said it before, I'll say it until I no longer possess breath. Like cooks and dishwashers in a restaurant, Tech Crew doesn't get nearly the attention they deserve. Without them, all we starlets on the front side of the scrim would be dancing nekkid to no music in the dark before an empty auditorium.
In the case of all those lights dancing in the North Forest, Tech Crew also extends to Tech.
So here's a round of applause to stark black machinery, boxy metal cases, military camouflaging, plugs and corded eyesores. Huzzah to screws and nails and drills and bolts, to speakers and hi-fi and laser canons blasting wonder into the night. Woot to the generator. Whoop to the extension cord and the people who painstakingly wind them around elbows. Cheers to the storage crate. Salutes to packing materials. Great gobs of ballyhoo to trucks, construction machinery, shuttles, trash bins, and their operators. Yee-haw to the utility boot and the designers of tread that make it possible to traverse every one of those steep hills. Also, knee-braces.
May I take a moment to bow down to the people who poked every one of those gazillion faerie glow-bobs into the dirt (and took them all out), and to whoever stuck every bloody "stick" onto that Hearth. Worshipful reverence to every artistic engineer who aligned a light, computer-generated or eyeballed a trajectory, adjusted a sound board knob, or moved a rock. God-rays upon the almighty wi-fi. Angelic choirs to computerized synchronization.
All Hail the Tech.And yes. I have completely discordant reactions to the sensations of screws drilled into living trees so that we human-centric creatures could enjoy this miracle. Being an HSP is incredibly fun. Simultaneously, it is excruciating. We simply learn to live in dichotomy. Or it eventually drives us mad. Sometimes that's part of the fun... Hail, Dionysos.
🌿🍇✨😈✨🍇🐍
© 2022 Hartebeast
“Ahem. I'll be okay. Sorta” — this made me giggle.
And this bit at the end — “As the final sunflares vanished behind the hills, I made my exit from the North Forest like before, exhilarated and mournful. Inspired and more than a little choked up.” — was so cute (and such good writing).
If these lights ever do come back, you should definitely be hired to write all the promotional material for them, as you sell them so well. :)