SCENIC LIGHTING

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 49, 27 February 1934, Page 10

SCENIC LIGHTING

THE QUEENLY MOON

AND THE KINGLY BEAM

ELECTRIFYING NATURE

(By "N.Z.")

A good many years ago, the limestone formations in the Jenolan Caves, New South" Wales, were electrically lighted. Electric light was then introduced into the Waitomo Caves. Now New South Wales is applying "scenic lighting" to open-air scenery in the Blue Mountains, and there has been some argument as to how far, legitimately, this embellishment of Nature should go. The caves precedent docs not carry very far in the matter, for in caves neither sun nor moon (nor star) penatratcs, but the landscape is subject to both; so even, at night scenic lighting competes with jiatural light. TAMPERING WITH NATURE. A writer in a Sydney contemporary, evidently striving after a balanced view of an arguable matter, admits that "to tamper with Nature is a risky matter,'? but yet seems to think that the moon and the stars leave out a great deal that a high power, electric light, at night, can show to advantage. Of the Blue Mountains scenic lighting he writes:—That Nature has not been despoiled, however, by this scheme of scenic lighting, but is revealed in all the delicate charm of new aspects, unsuspected in the daylight, is a view on which there is general agreement among visitors. Handled with regard for the treatment of beauty in Nature, the scheme of scenic' lighting lends itself to effective extension in many directions,, especially with the approach of the season when, amid the beautiful glades and bowers, the falls and streams will be in full flow. . . . The lighting effects bring out, in many charming Vignettes, Nature's diverse colour tones, in the massive stones; in the interplaying lights and'shadows on the rugged rocks; in the shimmering) sparkling falls and streams; in reflections in quiet pools; in the concentration of light, on the water tumbling over the cascades; and in'the crystal-like effect of the broken water on the small falls and cascades'. With the dry season the Blue, Mountains waterfalls are apt to contract to small proportions, a circumstance which, by night, artificial lighting might possibly camouflage. ;. ENHANCING NIGHT BEAUTIES. But, however ■well, and however honestly, the writer may stress those night beauties which aro enhanced by electric lighting—emphasised above power of moon and stars—it is to; be feared that he will ' never convince Wordsworth, ■ who has left gems of poetic insight like the following: • Waters on a starry night • Are beautiful and fair; v . \ The sunshine is a. glorious birth: But yet I know, where'er I go, ■ That there hath passed away a glory from , the earth. Nearly a hundred years ago Wordsworth shrank apprehensively from a scienco that one day, with gigantic eye, would peer into his own peculiar field: True it is Nature hides '■' Her treasures less and less. Man now presides In power, where, once .he trembled in hip weakness; Science advances with gigantic strides; But are we aught enriched in love and meekness? • The strides that were gigantic in 1838 are nothing like the strides of today;: when a 448,000- candle-'powbr beam can bestride the Blue Mountains and think nothing of it. Six narrow-, beam copper projectors, each with a beam of that candle-power, havo been placed on Echo Point to concentrate on the remarkable rock-peaks known as The Three Sisters. But elsewhere in the Blue Mountains the scenic lighting is not so concentrated to a spot, and seems to aim at illuminating banks and bowers where Titania might have lingered (if she does not mind electric I light) and at presenting trees and their "filagrced branches" in an earth-born light.not competing with tho influence of "a soft, velvety, star-spangled sky." . MAN-MACHO,-JPor thousands of visitors, it' is claimed, the scenic' lighting enables access to places previously inaccessible* at night, with less risk of falling over precipices (unless one desires to do that spectacularly) and with increased comfort and satisfaction. Looking inside the machinery of this man-magic, it is found that "the- approximate consumption of eleStricity by the 28 projectors is 18 units an' hour for the scenic lighting, as* distinct from the projectors for tho floodlighting of The Three Sisters." But science, although it equals about half a million candles in one beam, yet tries to be selfeffacing: "Many of tho copper projectors installed for the scenic lighting aro. so camouflaged as. to blend with the- surrounding scenery and to prevent them from being an eyesore during the day, while much of the wiring has been undergrounded to avoid interfering, by overhead cable construction, with tho natural beauty of the area to which the scheme has been applied." The Naturo lovers who givo a'qualified approval to the electrification of Nature consider that they know where to stop. But are they capable of stopping other people f For instance, they rebuke the man who, suggested that tho electric lights should be coloured. Coloured lights would be "discordant , and garish." But a generation ago many of the present feminine complexions would have been considered discordant and garish; so also would some of tho brilliant paints applied to buildings. Times change; and scenic lighting, once' general, may prove to be difficult to discipline. Is democracy approaching the time ■when it -will have to elect triennially a, Board of Good Taste with wide powers, and will the resultant cultural , wars place political campaigning quite in the background?