Missing the Sun? Have a Light Festival

Communities across the globe are finding ways to brighten up long, dark winter nights and cheer up citizens at the same time. They are throwing Light Festivals. From Estonia to the Yukon Territory, residents use the tradition of partying to cure those wintertime blues.

The idea in Estonia, which was the subject of a recent NYTimes blog for the solar-perplexed, is to combat Seasonal Affective Disorder (S.A.D.) in the small European nation by mixing fire, art, and jubilance. Estonia has very long, cold winter nights, enough so that approximately one in five citizens suffer from S.A.D. Their creative contention is that if the sun won’t shine they’ll light up the night on their own.

Students and artists are commissioned to build “fire sculptures” which are ceremoniously burned during the Light Festival held in Tallinn, the nation’s capital. With the help of their favorite local spirits, Estonians enjoy the light, warmth, and party atmosphere long into the night — staving off the darkness that normally encompasses them.

They use creative recycling as well — cutting up old Christmas trees, straw, and hay to make burnable wood sculptures.

But this and other similar festivals are nothing new. Humankind has long incorporated fire into solstice celebrations to cheer themselves up and encourage the rise of spring and summer, with the warm sunlight that accompanies them.

So here you have humans creating their own natural light and warmth in order to stay comfortable and cheery during long winter nights. Hmmm … sounds a bit like residential solar power don’t you think?

photo credit: Valgus Festival

Posted on February 9th in Solar Information by Dan.