Festival of Lights features top acts
Covid ruined the party last summer but the TSB Festival of Lights is back with a vengeance.
The New Plymouth District Council-organised event begins on December 17 and will feature 13 lighting installations and dozens of performers over five weeks, bringing thousands of people into Pukekura Park.
Headlining the lights will be Evanescent, a creation of immersive bubbles designed by Atelier Sisu, a Sydney-based design studio whose work has featured across the world.
New Zealand designer Angus Muir’s works on display will include Filament, which was inspired by the pohutakawa frond and features 25 wands sweeping out of a steel base.
Children, and probably most adults too, will welcome the return of the UV Spaghetti installation, which this year will have 9km of glowing rope to get tangled in.
On the entertainment side, Los Angeles-based DJ duo Fleetmac Wood is one of the biggest names making a return in a lineup of more than 40 bands playing at various venues around the park over the five weeks.
Fleetmac Wood, which is not a tribute act but a set that reframes the music of Fleetwood Mac, proved hugely popular when they last played in 2019.
Lisa Jelliffe, aka DJ Roxanne Roll, and Alex Oxley, aka DJ Smooth Sailing, transformed Pukekura Park’s Hatchery Lawn into a dance floor of techno, disco and house music, with organisers saying the pair are back by ‘‘massive’’ demand.
The pair are touring the United Kingdom at the moment with shows in Manchester, Glasgow and Dublin.
The increasingly popular New Year’s Eve party is back with children’s activities, including a silent disco and parade, while six different acts have been booked to play across the Hatchery Lawn and Fred Parker Lawn between 7pm and 12.15am.
New Zealand-based DJproduction duo Sweet Mix Kids, who have featured at Rhythm & Vines, will help bring in the New Year. The pair, Sandon James and Chris Scott, were a finalist at the Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards and have supported or played private parties for the likes of Adele, Ed Sheeran and Coldplay.
‘‘The festival has made a great name for itself by showing new light installations each year instead of rolling out the same year after year,’’ New Plymouth District Council event lead Lisa Ekdahl said.
‘‘It is also an opportunity for a range of artists to showcase their talents.’’
The festival, which attracts more than 150,000 visitors to the park, costs $700,000 to stage but contributes millions to the Taranaki economy. Nearly half those who visit are from outside the region.
The summer festival also features works from lighting artists Castor Bours and Wouter Widdershoven from the Netherlands, and Australia’s Chris Canole whose work features multiple arrays of convex mirrors suspended above the ground which rotate.
One of the biggest nights of the festival will be one day after it starts, with Christmas at the Bowl scheduled for Sunday, December 18.
Like the festival, the event was cancelled last year because of Covid.