Ultimate nighttime selfie: Astonishing 'Field of Light' arrives at Australia's Uluru - Los Angeles Times
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Ultimate nighttime selfie: Astonishing ‘Field of Light’ arrives at Australia’s Uluru

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In the 1989 film “Field of Dreams,” Kevin Costner’s character famously heard -- “If you build it, they will come” -- and created a baseball diamond for ghosts to play ball.

Now a dream imagined 24 years ago by artist Bruce Munro on his first visit to Australia’s majestic Uluru has become a reality too.

“Field of Light” is a temporary art installation featuring a forest of 50,000 solar-powered lights with the sandstone landmark as a backdrop. The display, which opens Friday, is located about six miles from Uluru, a.k.a. Ayers Rock, in Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in the country’s Northern Territory.

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“Light has always intrigued me as a medium,” Munro says. “There’s something poetic about it. It goes on and off, and this skin of luminescence allows us to see the world around us – a mysterious energy – one thing you can’t grasp.”

When Munro first sketched out a field of light on 10 to 15 pages that he stuck together, he thought it would be impossible to create a huge display in the middle of nowhere with no electricity.

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His first temporary “Field of Light” was created in 2004 for London’s V&A Museum. Other temporary fields have appeared around the U.K. and the U.S., including Sonoran Light at Phoenix’s Desert Botanical Garden until May 8.

Munro credits Ray Stone, the general manager of marketing for Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia for bringing his artistic vision to Australia. “In 2010, Ray heard me on the radio describing how Uluru first inspired ‘Field of Light.’ He phoned me up two days later and said: ‘Hey, I think you should come out and do this installation,’ ” Munro says.

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A variety of tours are available with prices starting at approximately $27 ($35 Australian) for adults. All include transportation from area hotels. Accommodations at Ayers Rock Resort, where the sculpture is located, range from luxury to camping.

The Night at the Field of Light tour option includes a three-course dinner for about $178 for adults ($235 Australian]. For a Night tour that includes a camel ride it’s $284 ($375 Australian). And dinner plus a helicopter flight costs about $467 ($615 Australian).

Profits from “Field of Light” will help the local community. The local Anangu tribe have named it Tili Wiru Tjuta Nyakutjaku or “looking at lots of beautiful lights” in Pitjantjatjara, the local language.

The art display remains until March 31, 2017.

Info: “Field of Light”

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