On holidays and special occasions, Torontonians are used to seeing fiery explosions of colour in the night skies above Lake Ontario. In the evenings until March 27, we need to train our gaze lower: at the shoreline itself, which ignites not with fireworks, but with rivers of colour, towering constellations of light, and glowing sculptures that transform the night into a living canvas.
Located at Trillium Park at Ontario Place, Lumière: The Art of Light is a free outdoor art-at-night festival that is a masterpiece of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) education and spectacle. For its fourth year, the theme is “Rhythms of Light: Motion, Sound, and Time” – which is brought to life in fourteen wildly creative installations by Ontario based artists working with the most fundamental materials of all: light, kinetic movement, sound – either recorded or manufactured – and time itself, whether dilated or momentary.
The exhibition as a whole is a remarkable driver of discussion, and here are just a few highlights that stood out to me.
The first piece you encounter as you walk through the exhibit is called Wind II: The Wave by Samuel Kiehoon Lee, who was thinking about breathing, and was influenced by the passing of his mother from lung cancer. This work contains panels that move as the wind blows, if a person touches the work, or when a runner just breezes by the work – showcasing the idea of rhythm. The panels are in different variations of colour ranging from neon green, orange, purple, blue and yellow. When viewed from the side, the panels all lead towards the CN Tower and Lake Ontario – forming a picturesque opportunity for colourful selfies.
Another standout is the colourful Möbius Ensemble created by Bitbrainz. It is a looped sound, flipped as a Möbius strip: an endless surface, on which every note returns transformed. This work of art uses compositional structures from German composer and musician Bach. You are tasked to compose your own song, which becomes an ensemble, as the installation works with artificial intelligence to generate the music. You can choose different instruments or utilize the composition panel to see how changes affect the existing compositions. And as you walk around the sculpture, you will notice flashing lights and colour: the way the Möbius strip pulls, everything on one side is right-side up.
In a different work tied to the theme of motion and light, new artist Matt Creative created Arbor to bring to life the hidden network within trees. Patterns of light showcase different flows of water, nutrients, and energy that once ran within a tree at different seasons of its life. Outfitted to detect movement close to the installation, sensors trigger the tree to activate and reveal these different light patterns.
A wonderfully meditative piece is Blueberry Babies Signal Path, a circular listening area composed of a cymatic, water-filled basin with a continuous composition playing through the speakers. In the basin, the sound of the song creates visible vibration patterns in real time. Lighting responds to the same sound, shifting and moving with it. You can sit, stand, listen, or meditate quietly—or interact with the exhibit by speaking a short phrase or breathing into a microphone. Your sound will be gently blended into the audio, with the basin instantly showing the new vibrations, and the lights changing at the same time—turning your presence into rhythm, pattern, and light. Created by Winta (Wintana) Hagos, who works with sound healing, this piece is a living tribute to her parents’ journey from Eritrea, across East Africa, and ultimately to Canada. The waves that move across the basin reference water and passage: oceans crossed, borders navigated, and the emotional tides of migration. As viewers engage with and alter the surface, their presence symbolically retraces her parents’ path, participating in their story of movement, resilience, and transition.
A different eye-catching work is switch/grass created by Nathan Fisher, Daniel Pechersky, Diana Tran, Liam Clarke and Joe Kinsella. This piece examines the natural cycles and patterns in plant ecosystems, and turns them into a different interactive sculpture that uses changing light and sound to bring those patterns to life.
Tyler Burey’s work We Move Together is inspired by the artist’s Indigenous heritage and themes of movement. It features a stunning statue of the great crane Ajijaak, who in Anishinaabe oral tradition, descended from the sky to share the gift of dance with people in conflict. The twist is that the statue incorporates the visual language of contemporary dance floors and mirrored spheres. During the daylight, it appears as a large mirrored crane that reflects natural sunlight and reveals symbols in certain areas. At night, the sculpture becomes a display of vibrant colours and reflection, with internal structures that gently move. We Move Together invites us to consider how tradition and modernity move together, illuminating our shared rhythms and restoring a sense of harmony.
Echoes of Light highlights the sophisticated sensory process used by bats, and captures the attention of the viewer in two ways: through an interactive experience that activates different colours based on the voice type speaking to it; and a symbolic natural theme focused on the extinction of animals such as the bats.
When I visited, several of the featured artworks and their interactivities were still works in progress. This ongoing development feels intentional: an exploration of the element of time, and an invitation to audiences to return to observe new additions, and experience how the works continue to evolve in response to their surrounding environment.
I recommend accepting that invitation – it’s free, it’s fascinating, and it’s family-friendly.
Lumière: The Art of Light runs until March 27, 2026, and it even includes warmup bonfires (weather-permitting) on Friday and Saturday nights during March Break. For information, visit ontarioplace.com.
© Arlene San Augustin, Sesaya Arts Magazine 2026
