PILLAR OF LIGHT
The "Pillar of Light: An Earth Day Revival and Community Sculpture Project" was designed by James Colby (on view April 22 to November 22, 2018). The sculpture, ArtReach, funding, and marketing were over two years in the making. The monolith measured 13'X5'X5' and weighed nearly one ton. The components included 1,056 wide-mouth, quart Ball Jars, shredded paper, galvanized steel, wooden dowels, fiberglass rods, electrical wire and conduit, and LED lamps. There were twenty-two stacked floors or levels. Each layer held forty-eight jars that circled the edge and rested on steel rings (floating buttresses) attached to a multi-layer wooden spine in the back.
Each glass vessel contains shreds from elementary and middle school students' "Love of Nature or Earth Advocacy Images." Although the obliterated artworks make each creation and artist anonymous, the ideas and imaginings fix within each participant's body, mind, and spirit. As in Buddhist sand mandalas, the destruction (shredding) symbolizes nature's transience flux forces. Hopefully, the "ecological etchings of the heart" will move students from individual awareness to participation within the transformative ecological zeitgeist. As in photography, the "Pillar" represents writing or drawing with light, revealing how each child's mind's eye imagines and represents Mother Earth's numinous beauty.
Light radiates from the Pillar's core, passes through each jar and shredded artifacts, and into citizens' eyes. Within the dark sanctuary, guests envisioned the "Pillar of Light" as a cylindrical skyscraper piercing the darkness. Light has symbolized virtue, eternal truths, and enlightenment through the ages. Philosophers, prophets, physicists, scientists, and saints use radiant forms as metaphors. Quantum physics parallels Buddhist's space and time reality; this vision recognizes the inner light (Buddha Nature) as an omnipresent web or wave of consciousness within all Earthly objects and life forms.
A good friend of mine shared this: "Your' Pillar of Light' suggests an object that is fleeting yet permanent, transparent yet solid, fragile yet strong. We grow luminous, tall, and protected within a critical mass of supporters. Real and luminous connection allows everyone to shine bright and beautiful." I certainly agree: collaboration, cooperation, and the recognition of Rachel Carson's unity-of-life insights are the keys to solving today's eco-cultural challenges.
Three stages of seven LED tube lights, seven LED work lights, and seven LED flood lamps illuminate the Pillar. LED tube lights are twice as efficient as fluorescent lights, and LED floodlights are six times as efficient as tungsten lamps. The Pillar required only five hundred and seventy-four watts. Viewers were amazed at the lumens from the limited wattage.
Sponsors and Collaborators: The GreenUp Jamestown Coalition (GUJC), the Reverend Luke Fodor, and a host of community members and St. Luke's parishioners co-constructed the "Pillar of Light." Chautauqua County art and science teachers submitted student artworks and Earth Day Pledges: Marygrace Anderson, Jenny Brown, Cheri Burk, Lisa Colby, Mary Maggio, Renee Mitchener, Susan Schrader, Danica Olson-Walter, and Lina Scoma.
Funding was provided in part by the New York State Council on the Arts Decentralization Regrant Program with support from the New York State Legislature and Governor Andrew Cuomo and administered by Tri-County Arts Council. Corporate sponsors include Interlectric Corporation, Warren, Pennsylvania, and Solar Liberty, Buffalo, New York. The Episcopal Church of New York City, Jamestown Rotary, Chautauqua Region Community Foundation, and Arthur R. Gren Co. Inc. sponsored the GUJC lecture series and Earth Day ArtHappening event for the "Pillar Light." WRFA-LP 107.9 FM and MEDIA ONE GROUP (WWSE, WJTN, WHUG, WKSN, AND WQFX) donated advertising and interviews for partners and presenters.
GUJC partners include Audubon Community Nature Center, Chautauqua Watershed Conservancy, Jamestown Community College, Robert H. Jackson Center, Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History, St. Luke's Episcopal, and Zion Covenant Church.
Over five thousand residents, young and old, participated in Greenup Jamestown Coalition and "Pillar of Light" activities. The process of talking about Earth Day history, listening to scientists, making art, reading numerous newspaper articles, listening to radio interviews, viewing presenters' photographs and films, and contemplating solutions are critical to visualizing and advocating ecological transformations.
Environmental "Hope Springs Eternal!" Rachel Carson changed the world with her will and wisdom, Zen-like observations, poetic writing, and "Silent Spring." Other environmental activists, like Lois Gibbs, brought attention and resolution to the Love Canal disaster. W. Eugene Smith exposed mercury poisoning in Minamata, Japan, and brought global awareness and change.
Carson, the modern environmental movement mother, sparked a paradigm shift and Zeitgeist—Earth Day, April 22, 1970. Over twenty-three million Americans joined forces to stop the pollution of the environment.
Earth Day equals "Us-Day;" this emphasizes that all life is interconnected, interdependent, and One. Global citizens united for Earth healing with the Montreal Protocol and the Paris Agreement. The exponential growth of population and today's local to global environmental challenges require citizen excellence like never before.
James Colby, artist, environmental activist, former Weeks Gallery director, and co-founder of the GreenUp Jamestown Coalition and St. Luke's Wellness Partnership, lives in Lakewood, New York. Farms, forests, and wetlands surround this village bordering Chautauqua Lake.