Let there be light in wintery Helsinki

Our photographers take to the streets for Lux Helsinki’s light installations, which illuminate the city every January.

Lux Helsinki’s urban light installations illuminate the dark of winter each January. Our photographers take to the streets and return with a colourful slideshow.

In 2014, Finnish artists were joined by colleagues from France and Germany for a total of 12 different installations that lit up the city in early January, including one indoor light-art exhibition. The annual event attracted more than 150,000 tourists and Helsinkians to explore the city from new points of view despite the cold weather.

Lux Helsinki: Colour in the capital

Jukka Huitila’s “Variant Spectrum 2” illuminates the 72-meter (236-foot) tower of the Olympic Stadium. Photo: Susanna Alatalo

French artist Philippe Morvan created “Cosmocole,” a solar system of light and sound, in the amphitheatre behind the Finnish National Opera. Photo: Susanna Alatalo

Hong Kong meets Helsinki at Hakasalmi Villa in Twinsen Ho’s installation “Little Spirits” inspired by the “Secret Book of Gnomes.” Photo: Leena Karppinen

A member of Fire Troupe Etna kindles torches for the performance “Disk,” in which the central idea is the interaction between fire and light. Photo: Leena Karppinen

In one of the four episodes of “Disk,” performers from Fire Troupe Etna protect themselves from the rain with burning umbrellas. Photo: Leena Karppinen

Old low-pressure sodium lamps from the Helsinki–Turku highway were used in Jenni Kääriäinen’s light installation “Sodium Sun.” Photo: Leena Karppinen

Dan Shorten’s video mapping work “Reveal” allows passers-by to interact with the piece via infrared cameras along the Baana pedestrian and bike path. Photo: Susanna Alatalo

The Finnish National Theatre was the first public building to be turned pink by Ainu Palmu’s “Pink Caravan.” Each day during Lux Helsinki, a different landmark building got a new, pink facade. Photo: Leena Karppinen

German artists Sabine Weissinger and Freidrich Förster team up as Casa Magica. Their sound and video projection “Emergence” is inspired by the sea. Photo: Susanna Alatalo

The video projection “Emergence” presents Helsinki Cathedral as a mythological object between the sea and the sky. Photo: Leena Karppinen

Jukka Huitila’s “Variant Spectrum 2” represents the colour spectrum of coal on the side of the Olympic Stadium tower. Photo: Susanna Alatalo

By Susanna Alatalo and Leena Karppinen, January 2013, updated January 2014