The LightClock below situates the viewer in the daily and seasonal variations of light and dark that act as a master clock for life on earth. Future iterations of LightClock will incorporate the sonic landscape to attune viewers with relationship between light and activities captured by sound in the landscape at various timescales.
The LightClock measures time according to the changing luminosity and colour of the sky over the day and night and throughout the year. Daily and annual variations in natural light entrain the circadian rythyms and choreograph the behaviours and life cycle events (phenological cycles) of most life on earth. Meanwhile, anthropogenic light at night (ALAN*; light created by human technologies) adds noise to the cycles of light and darkness related to sunlight and moonlight and can disrupt both human and non-human biologies and behaviours. The LightClock makes these cycles of natural and anthropogenic light legible.
The clock traces out the changing ambient light as a helix of coloured dots. Each revolution corresponds to the changing light over a period of 24 hours. The helix is shown in perspective and thus appears as a spiral, with the present moment at the head of the outer ring (at the 12 o’clock position) and the past spiraling anticlockwise towards the centre.
*ALAN is usually referred to as artificial light at night. This project approaches human activity, including human-made technologies, as part of nature rather than distinct from it, much like a crow’s nest would be considered crow-centric but nonetheless part of nature.