Lumiere London

The "Lumiere" festival of lights has come to London!  And of course we wanted to go and see it.   But, "due to maintenance work," both our tube lines are out of action this weekend. Buses are very crowded and some are also on diversion, so it is no easy task to get into the centre.

At first we moaned about the incompetence of ... well, someone. Whoever organises these things.  "How stupid to put on a festival when so many people won't be able to get there... how disappointing.... bet nobody goes to it ...."

When we reached Piccadilly Circus, however...

we found ourselves in the most enormous crowds I have seen since the Millennium.   Luckily they were extremely good natured, but even so you can imagine how it felt being in the middle of this.

It soon became clear that the event organisers had vastly underestimated the numbers who would turn up to see these fantastic light installations.    Thank goodness so many trains were not running, is all I can say!

The installations are all over the city, and we didn't even see half of them, so we hope to return tonight (see below),  However, even if we don't see the rest, it was worth going in just for Les Lumineoles, below, in Piccadilly.



This installation of huge creatures, a cross between fish and spaceships, was created by the French company Porte Par Le Vent   When you're actually there beneath them, they seem awfully large, and they do look alive. The music that accompanies them (not clear on my video, sadly) enhanced the unearthly atmosphere.

Actually, the creatures are kites. I spotted one of the operators.

My second favourite installation, in Regent Street, was Keyframes, by the French group LAPS. This video is part of a much longer musical show, in which these little figures can be anything from ballet dancers to computer games.  Here, as the music suggests, they are being a computer game.



Onlookers absolutely loved this one.  It was so dark that I couldn't get good pictures of their enchanted faces, but this is typical.  I could feel a huge smile over my own face, too.



In St. James' Square, illuminated human figures sat on top of buildings or floated amongst the trees.

This is how they looked a little closer up.  As you walked towards them, they seemed to be moving against the dark sky. 

This installation was called "The Time Travellers", and it's by Cedric le Bourgne - check out the amazing bird picture on his website, here.  If you notice a certain French slant to the names, I think it might be because France seems to go in for light installations. We've often seen Son et Lumiere presentations on visits to France, and I think they have them in other places too. But this festival is a first for London.

It was all but impossible to get through the four small gates into St James' Square at first, but the crowds were good natured and formed themselves into the traditional tube train queuing routine - walk on the right - and in the end everyone managed to squeeze into the more spacious park through the narrow little gates. And what a relief it was to get inside. Then, all you had to do was get out afterwards....

I don't think the organisers can have been expecting anything like this number of spectators, because little thought seemed to have been given to finding sensible and practical places to site some of the installations.  We wanted to see Deepa Man-Kler's "Neon Dogs", but it was at ground floor level in a shop window past which ran a none-too-wide pavement.  What with people trying to see the installation, or walk past on the pavement, and not get knocked off into the traffic, this ended up as another one we simply couldn't manage to see.

Apparently the installations at Kings Cross had to be switched off last night because of overcrowding.    T and I want to see them though, so we might get along early this evening. I don't know how we will get to Kings Cross without the tube. There aren't any buses going there from here.  Perhaps we will drive to a tube station on a line that IS open - if you can park. Or maybe we should just walk - it is walkable (just).

Today, I'm trying to get the details of a trip to Iceland sorted out.  Iceland in February might not be everyone's cup of tea but it sounds as if my trip will be very interesting, although very short.  Hope the bug has gone by then.  T and I can't believe how it is lingering. If it wasn't both of us we would start to wonder if there was something wrong with our immune systems, but it is much better than it was a couple of weeks ago, and for that I am grateful.