Chasing Rainbows/New Haven, 2004

New Haven Green and Yale Repertory Theater’s Plaza, New Haven, CT

Chasing Rainbows/New Haven (2004) was Site Projects’ inaugural exhibition. The billboard-sized light installation by Leo Villareal, illuminated first the New Haven Green, where it ran 24/7 for 7 weeks, and was then moved to the Yale Repertory Theater’s Plaza.

The opening event for the International Festival of Arts + Ideas, the work consisted of 3 large panels, connected to form a rectangle 24 ft wide X 6 ft high that floated 12 ft above the ground. Each panel was made of 60 acrylic tubes (each 8 ft long) containing thousands of LED’s in red, blue and green capable of producing a palette of 16 million color combinations. Each light was programmed by the artist to respond to a simple set of rules.

Inspired by mathematician John Conway’s Game of Life and using the principles of cellular automata (a field of mathematical research involving systems in which grid cells evolve in relation to neighboring cells), Villareal produced a complex system where the LEDs take on a life of their own, creating a kinetic rainbow made up of base sequences, triggered in random order and continuing for varied lengths of time.