Lumia is a form of art that uses light; originally associated with music but was later associated with painting. The term was coined by a twentieth-century artist, Thomas Wilfred.[1] In the early twentieth century, artists began to promote colors and light together in their works.[2] Wilfred worked towards establishing lumia as a new form of art, but the medium has yet to achieve popular recognition. -Wikipedia
W. Christian Sidenius Lumia Theater
Lumia Grounds 2017 - Newtown CT
I'd been driving by this property on route 34 in Connecticut for many years. I admired the A-frame garage and the exotic building far in the back of the property from afar. I saw the Lumia sign but never thought much of it until one day I was going through a book that randomly caught my eye in the university library. It was called Art and Technology and there was a page or two on a light-artist named Christian Sideneus. Amused to see the little A-frames in the book, I showed my wife. We headed out one fall afternoon and pulled into the seemingly abandoned property. I approached the neighbors from across the street and they told us a little bit about the property. The neighbor said she was keeping an eye on the place and we could go have a look as long as we didn't touch anything. That was a pretty good deal in my estimation so we went over with my camera and took as many pictures as I could of all the interesting features. The main house had cabinetry and geometric shapes in the windows similar to the Merzbau. Venturing into the back door of the Theater was pretty spooky since there was no electricity. With our cell phone flashlights blazing I managed to take some flash photography of the backstage area where all the controls were for the light show. I unfortunately do not have any shots of the open seating space in front of the screen but there were some pretty interesting controls and lighting instruments still there after all these years. About 2020 the property was sold and many of the little elements you could see from the street have been removed. I'm sure the interiors are now cleaned up repainted and looking much better. - Prof. Golda 2022