It’s cold, dark and dreary, and even though what felt like the longest January on record is finally over, the winter evenings are still in need of a bit of brightness to be bearable. So the Bristol Light Festival is back, and there are some absolutely stunning things to see, hear and experience on the streets of the city centre this week.
But while some of the installations on the walkabout route are just breathtakingly incredible, others will have you shaking your head.
Read next: Bristol Light Festival 2023: Map of all the incredible installations you can see
The 11 installations are all within striking distance of each other on foot. Don’t fear the dark alleys and streets in between too much - it’s pretty popular, so there are always people walking the same paths between the different locations, especially earlier in the evening.
They are numbered, but of course you don’t have to do it in the order on the helpful maps that are handed out for free by the numerous and friendly volunteers at each installation.
We approached from South Bristol so naturally the first one to reach was at St Mary Redcliffe Church. From there we went the short hop up to Temple Church, and then across to Finzel’s Reach and Castle Bridge, and headed into Broadmead, where there are two close together. Then it was a walk down to Corn Street, College Green and the others around The Centre and Queen Square. Our tour missed out the ‘Cheers Drive’ in the bus station - it was in previous Light Festivals and is permanently there now, so feel free to catch it next time you’re at the bus station after dark.
But what are the installations like? Well, a bit hit and miss - thankfully with the hits outweighing the misses. This year's Light Festival is bigger and better than previous years - with more jaw-dropping moments than ever before. So, in the order with which we tackled the walk, here goes:
Ophelia
St Mary Redcliffe Church
Going inside any church as grand and beautiful as St Mary Redcliffe in the evening is always going to be atmospheric and special, particularly with lots of people creating quite a buzz at our first installation.
Inside the church and off to the right in the western end, is a hologram installation. It shows Ophelia, who every English GCSE student will remember was told to get to a nunnery when her boyfriend Hamlet lost it, and was so distraught she drowned herself in a pond.
The thought of Ophelia in water has inspired much artwork since, and this is based on Millais' classic painting. There’s Ophelia, white dress flowing, surrounded by flowers, under the water, moving slightly and silently, head turning from side to side. It was eerie, and a little bit discomforting.
Yes, the effect is a stunning one. It looks absolutely amazing. The technology of creating such a hologram effect is mind boggling, and it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. And yes, Ophelia is a fictional character, but just as there’s something a bit problematic about creating classic artwork about suicide, it felt weird gazing down at a young woman drowned but seemingly alive, trapped under water, especially looking at this while a high profile search for a young woman in a river continues. What should and shouldn’t be art? I don’t know, but while this looked amazing, it felt awful.
Continuum
Temple Church
The next Redcliffe church was a huge contrast. It’s the first time in decades since the bombed out Temple Church has been opened up - previous Light Festivals have had installations in the diagonal corridor of huge trees in the churchyard. They are still there, but it’s inside the building that’s bookended by Bristol’s own Leaning Tower of Pisa that is truly magical. Tall pillars of mirrors surrounded by lights glow, dance and shimmer as they are approached - change colour as they are touched, with an unearthly tone changing as the many humans wandering among them interact with them.
This was a huge highlight of the Light Festival, and shows what can be achieved by combining light, mirrors and sounds, with the installation perfectly fitting into its incredible setting.
Beam
(Castle Bridge)
A short walk west to Castle Bridge, which is always one of the city centre’s most Instagrammable views, having been opened back in 2017. This time, lasers beam cross the floating harbour, dry ice bellows from below and a rainbow of light helps you on your way across the wooden curves of the bridge. It’s a light installation you are part of - it’s actually tricky to get a handle on (or a picture of) it all in its entirety as you’re in it, or on it. Another must see, and another really clever use of the setting.
Trumpet Flowers
(Quakers Friars)
One for the kids - the brightly illuminated flowers are a giant horn section when fat buttons are pressed down on their stalks. This is fun, and was full of small children endlessly slamming little fists down on the buttons. Some - in fact most - of the flowers didn’t seem to work, and the overall effect was basically the noise of the metal buttons being whacked. But it looked great and was the most interactive one so far…
Halo
(Broadmead)
…until the columns of different coloured discs right in the centre of Broadmead. I loved this one. Firstly, it’s great to see loads and loads of people bring Broadmead to life after dark - usually it’s a place you’re looking for a way out of, even at the relatively early hour of 6.30pm. But here it was full of families having fun. The pillars contain light-up discs and each one plays a different note. It’s possible to play a tune on one, just by touching the discs, and watch them light and sound up. Very futuristic, very cool.
Scream The House Down
(Corn Street)
Some of the light installations are beautiful, some are designed for kids to have fun, some are just fun for all ages, and Scream The House Down is all three. The windows of the Georgian Corn Exchange building - the frontage of St Nicks Market - light up in all different colours depending on the tone and intensity of sound.
And that sound is provided by whoever is brave enough to step up onto a little stage across the road, where a microphone is waiting on a mic stand. There were no shortage of people having a go - there was no queue when I was there, just people of all ages grabbing their few seconds to bellow, screech, holler, roar, yell or shriek down the mic and see the building light up.
It really is responsive to the noise produced, lighting deep red for an angry roar, blues and greens and yellows for higher, more gentle screams. This is genius, and so, so much fun.
Swing Song
(College Green)
An old favourite of the Bristol Light Festival, these swings are now on College Green. They look great, but there was a long queue so I can’t attest to their swinging experience. They are supposed to strike a different note depending on how high or how rigorous someone is swinging, but it wasn’t particularly loud or clear enough to tell.
Sirens
(Cascade Steps)
The absolute stand-out installation on the 2023 festival. Next to the boat launch pontoon at the bottom of Cascade Steps, the murky waters of the Floating Harbour are alive with light. Mermaids and other sea creatures swim around, appearing to be under the water, just below the surface, and just out of reach. It is mesmerising - many people there had been there ages. This isn’t one of the installation you see, take a photo of and then go ‘right, what’s the next one?’
How it’s done is unfathomable, it’s just there, to be gazed on in awe. Check out the wonderful description board too, announcing that mermaids are now on the endangered species list.
Let Us Shine
(King Street)
We were there on a Saturday evening and King Street was already buzzing with people out for the night - so maybe go earlier to this one if you’ve got kids. It’s a tall, brightly coloured and quirky tower. It looks nice, but as I approached I expected or hoped to be able to go inside it, or for there to be more to it than there was. It was also considerably dimmer than the images of it I'd already seen.
Alright My Luvver
(Queen Square)
This is another installation from a previous Light Festival and is still just as gut-twistingly cringe. This should not annoy me as much as it does. So with the full clarity that all it is, is some nice fun pink illuminated letters over the entrance to Queen Square, and is doing absolutely no harm to anyone, I still saw it and thought it needed to be yeeted into the harbour. Or maybe just switched off.
Where do I start? OK let’s start with the apostrophe. The first year I saw this I thought it had broken, and the letter H wasn’t being illuminated. On closer inspection, I realised it was intentional - there’s an apostrophe where the H should be, so it reads Alrig’t My Luvver.
I don’t know why it was done like that. Obviously, if you’re going to have an apostrophe to make the word ‘Alright’ feel, look or sound more Bristolian, you’d have it in place of the T at the end. Having it replacing the H makes no sense, because no one drops the H - you can't. You don't pronounce it in the first place. If the H is there as part of the way English uses 'gh' before 't' to turn Rit into Right, then apostrophise the 'g' as well. But that doesn't make sense either, because no one pronounces 'Alright' like it should sound like 'all writ'. Now with no 'h', it looks like it should be pronounced “All Riggut” or something. It’s no surprise that no artist has put their name to this abomination - it’s simply listed as being produced by the Bristol Light Festival.
Either they did it on purpose to mess with people’s heads, or they didn’t have a clue what they were doing and didn’t run it past someone who might know. Either way, I can’t look past it.
And then let’s get on to the actual substance of the work itself. Maybe the apostrophe catastrophe has clouded my normally level-headed view on this culturalisation of quirky Bristol or West Country things, but this feels cringe.
The popularisation and mainstreaming of little Bristol and West Country dialect sayings like ‘Gert Lush’, ‘Cheers Drive’ and ‘My Lover’ is an interesting topic for wider conversation: At what point does it switch from Bristolians celebrating their own words and phrases - like Lucy Wheeler and Beast Clothing have done for a good 15 years or more - to the city’s art and culture establishment trying to connect and ‘be more Bristol’, when they would never naturally say ‘Alright My Lover’ or ‘Cheers Drive’ in normal everyday conversations like I and tens of thousands of people from Bristol or the West Country do.
Of course, it’s not that deep. It’s just some illuminated letters. But when it’s coupled with a weird apostrophe, it hits wrong. It gives off an uneasy feeling that it might be another example of culture and art being done to the people of Bristol rather than with them. That may be incredibly harsh, of course. The Bristol Light Festival is a wonderful thing. It’s free, it’s accessible, it’s incredible and it brings the city centre to life in the darkest of winters. Go and check it out this week. And if you've got a spare pink neon H, take it with you - you might need it.
More things to do around Bristol:
- Valentine's Day 2023 in Bristol includes speakeasy dining experience and a 'love tour'
- Bristol Light Festival 2023: Map of all the incredible installations you can see
- Love Saves the Day 2023 line up first look including Fatboy Slim and Years & Years
- Big Jeff to perform first comeback show in Bristol since fire
