PreviousNext

123456

Thomas Edison once called Denver’s Curtis Street “the brightest street in America” due to the vast number of electrified theatre marquees shining brightly across the plains. But now, another avenue may be vying for top honors with the debut of Night Lights Denver, a collection of light, LED and projection art on display on the historic Kittredge Building along the 16^th Street Mall.

Funded in part by a grant from Colorado’s Office of Economic Development and International Trade, this project is a collaborative effort between the Denver Theatre District, Downtown Denver Partnership, Gart Properties, the Denver Pavilions, The Kittredge Building, Display Devices Inc., Denver Arts & Venues and the City & County of Denver.

“The Denver Theatre District was created to bring light, art and activity to [a 16-block area of] downtown,” said David Ehrlich, Executive Director, DTD. “We were honored to receive OEDIT’s first grant in the outdoor projection category and also want to thank the Johnston administration and the Downtown Denver Partnership for their ongoing guidance and support.”

Featuring rotating artwork that will showcase the artistry of local, national and international individuals and organizations, these collaborators hope that residents and visitors will be drawn to the Kittredge Building to view regular premieres of new artwork displayed on this larger-than-life canvas.

“The Kittredge Building jumped on the opportunity to work with the Denver Theater District and Display Devices to install a cutting-edge light projection project on the historic façade of the Kittredge Building,” said Nathan Roberts, Managing Director, Kittredge Ventures. “We view this as an amazing attraction to bring people to Upper Downtown, activate the streets in a unique way, and fill the restaurants in our building — West Saloon & Kitchen and 3 Margaritas.”

As leaders across the nation aim to revitalize their downtown cooridors, Denver’s video mapping project has an edge — the system was built to play generative and code-based artwork. This relatively new artform allows artists to realize an artistic vision through computer-based coding. Rather than using a paintbrush, the artist uses algorithms, code or process to generate visual or multimedia artwork. This unique-to-Denver feature will be leveraged in future projects, but to begin, Night Lights Denver will feature the works of four different artists:

WORKING DRAWING by Richard Mapes

Working Drawing examines the medium of drawing as the primary document by which architects communicate construction information. But what happens if an architect begins to produce different kinds of drawings to communicate more than just the organizational rationales of construction? Where does beauty live in the architect’s drawing, and how is it communicated before the building is built? Looking at line drawings, impressionist paintings and mosaic collages, Working Drawing imagines which personas that Denver’s Kittredge Building could adopt relative to different possible forms of architectural practice.

ORACLES ORACLE by Paulus van Horne

A sphere is a unitary entity, not easily integrated into a collective body. Oracles Oracle is then an exploration of the solitary nature of a sphere, even in a crowded space. Among the chaos of spheres raining down into the Kittridge building, each object remains itself, continually jostling for position in the crush of objects. The spheres do not become a unit but a crowd, packed together, waiting for the time they can regain their freedom of movement. Just as the Kittridge building fills entirely with spheres, the floor drops out from beneath the spheres, dispersing them like seeds into the darkness.

PORTAL MYCELIA by Limelight Art

Inspiration came when Senior Artist Alex Riczko read an article about mycelium found on asteroids, and how there is a chance mushrooms effectively came from space. That inspired the visual of bioluminescent mycelium, producing energy so dense and powerful that it has the ability to form portals to other dimensions.

CONVOLUTIONS by Cacheflowe

Convolutions is a real-time algorithmic animation system that was built specifically to spill across the architecture of the historic Kittredge building. Built with Cacheflowe’s personal creative coding framework called “Haxademic”, the software runs continuously, displaying new combinations of patterns and effects that will never repeat the same image. The title (Convolutions) refers to the low-level graphical processing steps that encourage the organic ornamentations to dance around the surface of the building.

“Creating moments of joy through art and activation has never been more important to downtown, and Night Lights Denver continues to do just that — lighting up our center city with brilliant art and animations that reflect the creative spirit of our city,” said Kourtny Garrett, President and CEO of Downtown Denver Partnership. “We are thrilled to see the Denver Theatre District expanding this program to include the Kittredge Building and invite Denverites and visitors alike to join us downtown enjoy this remarkable digital art experience.”

Night Lights Denver can now be seen on the corner of the Kittredge Building at 511 16^th Street across from the Denver Pavilions. The installation runs nightly starting approximately 30 minutes after sunset and ending at midnight. For more information, visit nightlightsdenver.com.