The Greater Manchester town where you’ll soon be able to experience the Northern Lights as festival visits

If you’ve ever wanted to experience the wonders of the Northern Lights in Greater Manchester, then your time has come. Bolton will welcome the ‘Put Big Light On’ festival next month and it is set to be one not to miss. 

The experience is one which you’ll be able to have in Bolton for six evenings in the lead up to Christmas. When the nights are long and dark, having the chance to see the town’s streets illuminated might be a perfect activity.  

One of the bigger attractions will be a free art trail, which includes works on some of nature’s most incredible features and will be available on each night of the festival. Amongst these is a work on the magnificent Northern Lights, see below for full details of the trail. 

Bolton Council’s Director of Corporate Resources, Lee Fallows, said: “I’m thrilled that we have managed to deliver such a fantastic light festival for our residents and visitors. It’s a great way to celebrate Christmas and provide free and accessible activities for families in Bolton throughout December.

“This forms part of our long-term cultural strategy where we are committed to breathing life back into the town centre and making Bolton an attractive place to live, work, study, visit and invest.”

Free Art Trail

Borealis- Dan Acher

Borealis brings the magical mystery of the Northern Lights to any city, using layers of light and particle clouds to create the illusion.

Museum of the Moon- Luke Jerram

Measuring six metres in diameter, the moon features 120dpi detailed NASA imagery of the lunar surface. At an approximate scale of 1:500,000, each centimetre of the internally lit spherical sculpture represents 5km of the moon’s surface.

Evanescent- Atelier Sisu

Evanescent is a multi-award winning artwork that has been exhibited in 24 different cities in 18 different countries. Evanescent bridges the gap between art and architecture, existing within the realm of ‘art-chitecture’.

Sound Intervention, Projector Bikes- Dan Fox Sound

Intervention’s amazing interactive off-grid audio visual machines will be illuminating the town centre streets during this year’s festival. These electric trikes travel along projecting colourful animations with accompanying soundscapes.

Spectral Vision - Liz West

Internationally acclaimed artist Liz West brings a major work from her back catalogue to The Vaults in Bolton. Our Spectral Vision creates a vivid immersive environment that mixes luminous colour and radiant light using a mixture of LED lamps and dichroic glass in the form of seven prisms.

The work explores our individual relationship with colour and our understanding of how we see it.

Aqualux on tour with Fox Bros. Peterbilt

Aqualux is an eye-opening art installation with an educational twist, an 8m by 3m creative lighting installation composed of 48 unfilled water containers, which typically hold 1,000 litres of water each, specially adapted to create a stunning, transportable and eco-friendly light feature to raise the importance of water.

Thursday November 30- Saturday December 2

Installations

 Borealis- Victoria Square- 4-10pm

Museum of the Moon- Library & Museum- 4-10pm

Our Spectral Vision- Market Place Shopping Centre- 4-10pm

Street entertainment

 Ebublio- 6-9pm

Ghost Caribou- 6-9pm

Snow globe- 6-9pm

Mystic Mirror Globe- 6-9pm

Activities

Lantern making- Museum- 4-8pm

Thursday December 7 Saturday December 9

Installations

Evanescent- Victoria Square- 4-10pm

Museum of the Moon- Library & Museum- 4-10pm

Our Spectral Vision- Market Place Shopping Centre- 4-10pm

Peep Hole Wall- Deansgate- 4-10pm

Projector Bikes- 4-10pm

Aqualux-Newport Street- 4-10pm

Street entertainment

Ebublio- 6-9pm

The Lumens- 6-9pm

Jacks of Frost- 6-9pm

Spark- 6-9pm

King Brass Band- Friday

Light up balloons- Museum- 4-8pm

Disco Dave- Museum- 4-8pm

December 10-21

Museum of the Moon will be on display from 2-8pm.