“With the passage of time,” says Yao ­Cheng-­chung, president of the Core­tronic Culture and Arts Foundation, “people who are busy chasing the latest trends, their eyes always on the horizon, become prone to neglect their own histories and to forget to turn and look at what can be found all around them.”

Consequently, the luminaries who comprise the CCAF’s board of directors, including Cloud Gate Dance Theater founder Lin Hwai-min, author ­Chiang Hsun, and lighting designer Lin Da-wei, decided that the foundation should find an identity in using light as a medium and awakening a new understanding of the land of Taiwan and its history.

Yet turning impassive lighting technology into art and culture is no easy feat. To “seek the light” about its identity, the foundation in its first year held a “lighting detective” workshop, inviting the public in both cities and rural areas to come together to “feel the light.”

Not only is a focus on light a rarity in Taiwan, even the executive team at the foundation entirely lacked any experience in that regard. Early on Fanny Hsu, CCAF’s executive director, even worried about whether such an abstract theme would attract the public’s interest. Fortunately, reports from more than 100 people at the design charrettes the foundation held greatly relieved the team’s doubts, and participants unexpectedly included a wide range of professions, such as public servants, dentists, insurance agents, and so forth. At the request of Lin Da-wei, the participants brought NT$100 notes to convenience stores to buy things, which were then combined with flashlights to spur “self-introductions to lighting.”    

Apart from putting on regularly scheduled “lighting detective” workshops every year, the foundation also has invited the lighting designer Chou Lien to hold a seminar about light in our daily lives and CCAF director ­Chiang Hsun to hold one on light in Tang-Dynasty poetry. Furthermore, crossdisciplinary collaboration was realized for a performance involving drums and lighting entitled “The Sound of Light.”

Coretronic Culture and Arts Foundation has been promoting its “Let’s Sense Light − City Project” campaign, sowing seeds of light in locales such as Tainan and Pingtung.

Temple of wind… and light

Aiming to leave a deep impression on the public, in 2012 the foundation started promoting its “Let’s Sense Light ‡ City Project” in locales such as Tai­nan, Ping­tung and ­Chiayi. These local projects highlight important locations in these cities in moving ways.

The idea for the campaign came from Chiang Hsun after a trip he took to Shang­hai to deliver a lecture. From the airport, his car gradually approached the city, and the LED billboards on either side of the elevated highway were overbearingly bright. ­Chiang was overcome with an uneasy feeling: “Technology ought to be about improving people’s lives. How has it turned into light pollution?”

Chiang reflected about the impact of technology on the environment and came up with the Let’s Sense Light − City Project. The first site selected was the Feng­shen (Wind God) Temple in Tainan.

With so many temples throughout Taiwan, why pick this one? Yao explains that the Feng­shen Temple has had an unusual history compared to other Qing-Dynasty temples in Taiwan.

Consequently, the foundation invited Chou Lien, an internationally famous lighting designer who was formerly president of the American lighting firm BPI, to take the helm of the project. Two years later, in September of 2013, the new lighting was ready.

After the reconfiguration, the jarring street lights had been removed, and new lights had been positioned low on walls. The temple’s stone bell tower was also lit up to highlight its open structure, and the red lanterns at the entrance were exchanged for hanging square lights. At night, the temple is now bathed in a warm yellow glow, and the tranquil aura of the old temple imparts a sense of its deity’s blessings.

As far as the foundation’s executive team is concerned, the completely new visual design for the temple was just a first step: The ultimate goal is to use directed lighting to get people to reexamine the traditional culture near them that they have gradually forgotten about. Once properly highlighted again, that historical legacy is certain to inspire great pride. 

After renovations, the temple’s new look attracted the public’s notice and helped to bring back some of the place’s splendor, with a market coming to the front courtyard. The young daughters of the temple’s caretaker, who used to be only concerned with Japanese and Korean pop stars, now have begun to bring their classmates to their own family shrine. They are gaining an understanding about the glory and treasures of extended families, with three generations living under one roof.

And that is precisely CCAF’s objective. “Eventually,” says Yao, “even if it’s just a start, you want people to notice and treasure what is being forgotten around them, so that locales can regain some of their original vitality.”

The Feng­shen Temple renovation was the first of the foundation’s city lighting projects, and many counties and municipalities took notice. That in turn gave the team increased confidence.

Nevertheless, Fanny Hsu reveals that at the beginning of the temple project, CCAF, which had only recently been established and was inexperienced with marketing, intended to name the project the “Light Environment Demonstration Project.” That proposal immediately got shot down by foundation board member Lin Hwai-min: “People who weren’t in the know would have thought it was the name of some sort of government project,” says Hsu. Eventually, Lin came up with the new name for these projects after being inspired by the Japanese architect Ta­dao ­Ando’s “Church of the Light.”

After renovations, the Fengshen Temple's new look attracted the public's notice and helped to bring back some of the place's splendor.

Reawakening a sense of the land’s beauty

After the Feng­shen Temple’s centuries of history had been properly highlighted again, the foundation turned to planting seeds of light in Heng­chun, at the southern tip of Taiwan.

In comparison to the temple, the project in the old town of Heng­chun has proven to be much more challenging. The old city wall built nearly 140 years ago no longer serves a protective function. But it still sits by busy thoroughfares and is a place where mothers and grandmothers gather for nighttime dancing. “It is more than just a historic wall” says Yao, “because all this activity provides meaning of its own.”

Consequently, the Light Up Heng­chun project is even more significant than the earlier project, and it has a broader scope. The number of people attending planning sessions has grown dramatically, says Yao. “It’s gone from a single small table to requiring a large conference room to hold everyone.”

During the early stage of the project, some people suggested, “Why don’t they just put a work of public art at the front of the plaza?” Others asked: “What about some kind of dazzling light show?” Eventually, though, they just settled on adding lighting here and subtracting it there to give the historic structure a new look. The restrained approach caused some to poke fun at CCAF for being short on cash.

It has been more than three years since the project began in 2013. The old city wall had become mottled and shabby with age, but now residents proudly show it off to out-of-towners.   

“At the moment of awakening, people’s sense of the land, as well as their confidence and pride, return,” says Yao.

CCAF president Yao Cheng-chung hopes to use light as a medium to awaken in people an appreciation for their local areas. (photo by Chuang Kung-ju)

Thanks to a few well-placed lights, Taipei’s Treasure Hill takes on an altogether different look at night.

CCAF puts on “lighting detective” workshops to help people gain an appreciation for lighting, which is an essential part of our lives.

CCAF puts on “lighting detective” workshops to help people gain an appreciation for lighting, which is an essential part of our lives.

The Naughty Swing dance troupe strut their stuff on the West Gate Plaza. After its makeover, Hengchun’s old city gate drew praise from all quarters.

Students at Hengchun Elementary School use light in a performance telling the story of their hometown.

A gentle light is cast against the old city wall, illuminating its century-long history.