Illumination and Vertigo

[Image: From Glow by Michael Light].

Angelenos, if you’re downtown tomorrow evening, Thursday, August 15th, consider stopping by the Mark Taper Auditorium at the Los Angeles Public Library to hear photographer Michael Light discuss his recent aerial work. I’ll be joining him for a public conversation about the photographs, moderated by curator Claudia Bohn-Spector.

The event accompanies an ongoing exhibition of Light’s work called Glow: Michael Light’s Aerial Views of Los Angeles. That explores “themes of mapping, vertigo, human impact on the land, and various aspects of geologic time and the sublime,” and it is open until September 8th.

Several years ago, my wife and I interviewed Light at great length about everything from wreck-diving nuclear testing sites in the Pacific to flying over huge geometric landforms in unbuilt suburbs near Las Vegas, so that’s perhaps a good place to start if you’d like to learn more about his work.

If you make it out tomorrow, say hello! The event starts at 6:30pm. Here is a map.