London architect Peter Culley will collaborate on a public art installation titled “Light House_1: Jackson Ward, Richmond VA” in downtown Richmond as part of a one-night event from dusk to midnight as for inlight Richmond on Friday, September 5.

From a VMFA press release:

Artist’s illustration of “Light House_1: Jackson Ward, Richmond VA” courtesy Peter Culley.

InLight Richmond will celebrate the 30th anniversary of 1708 Gallery, one of the country’s oldest artist-run galleries.

To be constructed in a parking lot between two buildings in the 200-block of West Broad Street, “Light House_1” will outline the doors and windows throughout an entire “ghost” house. Visitors will be able to walk through the installation as though it were real. Culley based his creation on a 19th-century row house in nearby Jackson Ward.

“I am struck by the enormous depth of these dwellings, which are different from the houses in Britain,” Culley says. “All the apertures will be painted with phosphorescent paint, but only certain sections of the piece will be illuminated at a time, almost in a dream-like manner.”

Culley is collaborating on the InLight Richmond project with Eleni Savvidou of L’Observatoire, an international lighting-design firm based in New York. L’Observatoire is the lighting design consultant for the VMFA expansion. Also collaborating on the project are Adam Frantzis of London, who developed the technology for much of the project, and Andrew Montgomery, a Virginia Tech architecture student who assisted with the analysis of Jackson Ward architecture and the project drawings.

“The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is delighted that international talent such as this can become a part of the fabric of Richmond’s creative community,” says Alex Nyerges, VMFA’s director. “We are always pleased to support arts organizations such as 1708 Gallery and reinforce the importance of art in our everyday lives.”

A number of VMFA staff are involved with 1708 Gallery’s InLight Richmond, including Emily Smith, curatorial fellow for Modern and Contemporary art. “I see ‘Light House’ illustrating the indefinable human relationships to buildings,” Smith says. “Viewing the installation at night will be like seeing an X-ray of the house.”