I feel inspired by people every time I spend time with strangers in festivals. This is a personal recollection of the last festival I have documented: Llum BCN.
“Fa goig”
Light festivals, generosity and joy
People clapped, enthusiastic, at the end of every light show during Barcelona’s light festival, ‘Llum BCN’. They were generous. They were happy. It started raining copiously on the second night of the festival, so people took refuge and smooched under canopies and inside vermuterias [vermouth bars], talking loud about all things Mediterraneans love shouting about in a bar at 10pm, while chomping anchovies, pa amb tomaquet, huevos estrellados, cava | beer | Vichy water.
As soon as it stopped raining, people went back to admire interactive moss & light projections, AI readings of the Book of Genesis, laser beamings over the stars, sea sound recordings, retroactive mirror reflections, or the frenetic dances of traffic lights… These were some of the highlight shows at this edition of the festival.
A seven year-old repeated, emphatic, how “the penultimate” set of traffic-light dances he had just seen was his all-time favourite show. “Era tan, tan, bueno”, he said to his mum, after watching Transit. A group of Gen Z lads had been in two-minds about queuing to see this installation; they debated it outside the warehouse hosting it – the same space they may have gone clubbing to the weekend before. “Yo nunca hago cola para bailar” [I never queue] said one of them, but a very smart-looking girl passing by told them it was worth it. “10-minute batches. The queue goes fast. It’s good. Maybe a bit trippy. You’ll like it”. So they all waited and went in. They all loved it.
Outside the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya, the major colonnade was surrounded by cars oozing smoke and beeping; another traffic jam, gone ballistic. A bunch of pensioners kept an eye and chatted over the pleasures of strolling on a Sunday night to face such weird wonders. “No está mal.” “ Y ¿qué es, esto?” “Unos coches, amontonados”. “Te gràcia”. “¿Vais a pasear más?” “Sí, miraremos qué hay. Está bonito”. “No entiendo mucho, yo”. “Va bien estirar piernas. Todos hemos salido a curiosear”. “Fa goig”.
“Fa goig“
“Fa goig“. A Catalan expression meaning ‘it creates (or, literally, ‘it makes’, ‘it transmits’) joy’.
Experiencing a free light festival in your neighbourhood makes joy. Seeing strangers smiling and clapping on the streets makes joy. Hearing the sound of jungles, oceans and galactic voyages in the middle of your city makes joy. With or without rain; with our without vermut.
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Am I fooling myself every time I write about optimism and joy? I do not think so.
Festivals offer the respite we need to remember our capacity for optimism. The festive allows us to forget about fear, for a while. Forgetting fear should help us recharge and take perspective, with greater empathy and a more lucid mind. We need this to face the relentless stream of news headlines and social media feeds taking over our screens day after day.
Get out to the street and be thankful for any festival still going out there. Smile and laugh with strangers for a while. Listen to them, puzzle over anything joyful on show, and applaud it. Recharge in public spaces, in the company of strangers you feel safe with. You can then go back to digesting the never ending flow of digital information taking over your individual devices; and you may dare be less fearful and more determined to make sustainable, constructive and hopeful choices.
