‘PRISM: Winter Lights’ Returns To Woodruff Park With Light And Water-Based Installations

“PRISM: Winter Lights” has returned to Woodruff Park in downtown Atlanta. The light and water-based installations will be on display through Jan. 31.

“City Lights” producer Summer Evans spoke with Ansley Whipple, the Project Manager for Woodruff Park—and with one of the artists featured, Ellex Swavoni.

The Atlanta Downtown Improvement District (ADID) partnered with Dashboard, an art agency, to curate all the installations that are shown in the exhibit.

This year’s outdoor exhibition will offer three light-based installations and a water-based installation at the International Peace Water Wall. All of the artists featured are local.

“This year for PRISM we have a new theme, which is water. We’ve added a component of water and that is a thread that runs through all of the pieces that you’ll see,” said Whipple.

Swavoni said she was inspired by the comic book character Galactus when creating the Afro-futuristic woman. The colors in the monument were inspired by rainbow squids, due to their luminosity and shifting colors.

“‘Atlantis Rising’ was a play on Atlanta. The image is of an Afro-centric woman who seems to be rising out of the ground as if she is rising up out of water to give this energy that something powerful is at play underneath the ground,” Swavni said. “It was inspired by deep-sea rainbow squids who are pearlescent and the color shift as they swim. So depending on the time of day, you’re going to get reds and golds. Closer to the nighttime, you’re going to get more purple, teal, and blue.”

PRISM is free and open to the public through Jan. 31. The water projections will be on view each night from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. on a loop.