Laser Lights Bring the Aurora Borealis Anywhere on Earth

This article originally appeared on The Creators Project.

Normally limited to the far reaches of the Earth, an artist is recreating the Aurora Borealis with a set of high-powered lasers. Swiss artist Dan Acher, of Happy City Lab's new project, BOREALIS, projects blue and green onto clouds in the night sky to create a facsimile of the Northern Lights. Acher's work is about creating public experiences that reach thousands of people, disrupting their daily routines. Last year he installed a giant light switch in Geneva that, when pressed by passers-by, projected a giant eyeball onto a nearby building.

With BOREALIS, he graduates from a building to the entire sky above the Swiss city of Lausanne. "People stopped in their tracks, in awe. Voices went quiet and, somehow, under this expanse covered by the lights, people would gather and create small groups to live this experience together," he tells The Creators Project. The result is reminiscent of Daan Roosegaard's, Waterlicht, which uses lasers to represent the water held back by Dutch dams.

For more of Dan Acher's work, or to bring BOREALIS to your city, visit his website.