Queenstown set to shine as LUMA light festival launches winter season

A family night out, enjoying every minute of 

LUMA 2017 in Queenstown, New Zealand. 

Credit: Che McPherson

Winter is on the way and Queenstown is counting down to an award-winning festival of light.Nights are closing in, the first snows have fallen in New Zealand's Southern Alps and Queenstown is counting down to the winter season that will launch with an award-winning festival of light.

The LUMA Southern Light Project returns to Queenstown on Queen’s Birthday Weekend (1 – 4 June 2018) featuring a world light festival ‘first’ with four evenings of illuminated art, light sculptures and entertainment.

Over 35,000 people braved the cold last year to go on a sensory after-dark journey through the iconic Queenstown Gardens and lakefront.

The free public event, which runs after dark from 5 – 10pm, focuses transforming space, public interaction, art, culture and education, inspired by curated collections of stunning light sculptures and thought-provoking installations.

Visitors can expect to be dazzled by an array of interactive and unique light displays, each one designed to encourage them to engage with the art and the surrounding Queenstown landscape.

Set within the picturesque Queenstown Gardens and waterfront, visitors can explore the illuminated winter wonderland with hot food in hand to warm the fingers.

The ‘world festival first’ will see local and international artists collaborating on an installation using over 90,000 individual light sources to turn trees in the Queenstown Gardens into an enchanted forest.

Auckland artist Angus Muir is returning to LUMA as the principle light installation artist and is excited about the collaboration.

“We’re going to create a pretty amazing, almost 3D volume, of light within the forest. We’ll be able to control the direction it moves, and create shapes within it, producing an amazing geometric work within an organic environment.”

Muir’s work will feature alongside creative art luminaries Jon Baxter, Puck Murphy and Nocturnal – Projection Mapping specialists, amongst many other local and national artists.

Trust chairman Duncan Forsyth says that LUMA is about enhancing and promoting the creative and cultural heart of Queenstown.

“LUMA 2018 promises to be the most innovative, immersive and interactive experience yet,” he says. “There really is something invigorating about connecting strangers on a dark and wintery evening through forms of light and music.”

The festival is run by a group of dedicated young Queenstown professionals who donate thousands of hours of their time to bringing the ‘life’ of the community back into the town centre.

LUMA Fast Facts:

WHEN: Queen’s Birthday weekend – 1 to 4 June 2018
WHERE: Queenstown Gardens and waterfront
WHO: All ages, free event from 5pm to 10pm daily

Full event information at www.luma.nz