This year, The LUMEN International Video and Performance Festival received an enormous gift— 150,000 tons of salt. Thanks to the extremely mild winter in NYC this year, the festival’s venue, Atlantic Salt Company, had a massive quantity of leftover salt that was not needed to melt snow on the streets. The pristine salt will serve as a projection screen for video, animation, new media works, and sound and light installations. Artists have sculpted the pile into “The Salt Garden,” an S-shaped structure that maximizes the space available for projection and creates several discrete performance stages.

Artists have also utilized shipping containers and empty warehouses around the site for their projections and performances. An industrial garage houses “The Main Stage” and will show a one-hour program on loop of video projections from leading local and international artists, curated by Chris Eamon. A highlight of this program is Alex Prager’s Petit Mort, a surreal exploration of both the literal and figurative meanings of the phrase. Also, keep an eye out for Tony Oursler’s secret surprise work.

LUMEN is for one night only at Atlantic Salt Co., Staten Island.
June 23, 6 p.m. – 12 a.m.