The LUMA Projection Arts Festival is an annual event, typically held in early September, in

Binghamton, NY Binghamton () is a city in the U.S. state of New York, and serves as the county seat of Broome County. Surrounded by rolling hills, it lies in the state's Southern Tier region near the Pennsylvania border, in a bowl-shaped valley at the conflue ...

focused on the art of

projection mapping Projection mapping, similar to video mapping and spatial augmented reality, is a projection technique used to turn objects, often irregularly shaped, into display surfaces for video projection. The objects may be complex industrial landscapes, s ...

. LUMA'a first show was in 2015 with three installations and an audience estimated to be 20,000. The LUMA Projection Arts Festival focuses on large, building-scale installations using a technique known as

, with the architecture of the city used as the canvas. It is the largest such festival in the United States focusing on this type of art. The conference has continued to expand each year, such as adding elements of

interactive media Interactive media normally refers to products and services on digital computer-based systems which respond to the user's actions by presenting content such as text, moving image, animation, video and audio. Since its early conception, various fo ...

in 2018. Each year, organizers debut several new animations designed to create the illusion that the neighborhood’s buildings are altering their physical structure. The festival presents additional live elements as a part of the projected works, such as orchestral music, motion captured actors, and audience interactivity. Each of the animations play on a loop throughout the night, separated by short countdowns. Organizers encourage visitors to walk the festival at their own pace and experience it as they would an outdoor art gallery. The work is commissioned both from international and local artists. Previous LUMA installations have included work with internationally recognized artists in cross-collaborative presentations, such as the 2016 debut of the first 3D animation of characters from the

BC (comic strip) BC most often refers to: * Before Christ, a calendar era based on the traditionally reckoned year of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth * British Columbia, the westernmost province of Canada * Baja California, a state of Mexico BC may also refer to: ...

with featured work from

Mason Mastroianni Mason Mastroianni is an American comic artist and the grandson of Johnny Hart, creator of the comic strips ''B.C. (comic strip), B.C.'' and ''Wizard of Id''. Mastroianni took over artist's duties on ''B.C.'' after Hart's death in 2007. "''B.C.'' ...

. The COVID-19 pandemic prompted LUMA's organizers to break format in 2020, partnering with

Opera Omaha Opera Omaha is a major regional opera company in Omaha, Nebraska. Founded in 1958, the professional company is widely known for the International Fall Festival events it held in the 1980s and 1990s, which garnered international attention and served ...

and

Tri-Cities Opera Company The Tri-Cities Opera Company (commonly known as "TCO"), founded in 1949 by Peyton Hibbitt and Carmen Savoca in Binghamton, NY, annually stages four full-scale operas per season, which typically runs from October until May each year. Tri-Cities Opera ...

to present one of the first documented live-streaming virtual reality operas, a production of

Kamala Sankaram Kamala Sankaram (born 1978) is an American composer, vocalist, playwright and actress. Based in New York City, she is best known for chamber operas about women who find themselves in situations where they are forced to confront patriarchal struct ...

's Miranda: A Steampunk Opera. The festival returned to its original form the following year.

References

{{reflist Art festivals Binghamton, New York