Second Annual Northern Spark
Contact:
Jaclyn Grossfield
Carmichael Lynch Spong
(612) 375-0656
Jaclyn.Grossfield@clynch.com
NORTHERN SPARK ALL-NIGHT ART FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES SECOND ANNUAL MINNEAPOLIS EVENT
Celebrate and Experience Creativity, Culture and Innovation at a Free Event the Whole Community Will Remember
MINNEAPOLIS – (April 16, 2012) ― Push your imagination to the limit and discover the creative culture of Minneapolis at Northern Spark, a one-night celebration of art, technology and community, beginning at dusk on Saturday, June 9 until dawn on Sunday, June 10 and free to the public.
The Northern Spark festival brings artists of all genres together for an entire-night celebration. Masters of interactive media, film, music, performance, comedy, public sculpture, light, DIY technology and more will display their work and engage visitors throughout the city of Minneapolis.
Exhibits will cover the city from the Stone Arch Bridge to the Walker Art Center, downtown, the Whittier Phillips neighborhood, Midtown Greenway and the University of Minnesota. A map of Northern Spark can be found on the organization’s website and via an interactive mobile app, which will launch the end of May. Northern Spark encourages art lovers and festival seekers to travel from event to event by foot, bus or bike. Those who choose to cycle and download the app can also order custom “auto-synching” Northern Spark “Kuramoto” bike lights by artist David Rueter. Event-goers will be fueled throughout the night by the city’s most popular food trucks.
“Northern Spark is the coolest cultural mash-up in the Twin Cities,” said Steve Dietz, founder, president and artistic director of Northern Lights.mn. “We are thrilled to have more than 100 artists and 60 partner organizations participating in Northern Spark. Last year more than 20,000 people from Minneapolis, St. Paul and the surrounding areas visited the festival to celebrate art and connect with the community. As one visitor memorably put it, ‘How often do you get a chance to be with thousands of people to see an experimental band, draw under the stars and wander through a gallery at 3 a.m. all in the same night?’”
For the week leading up to Northern Spark, the historic Stone Arch Bridge will host an impressive light installation to generate excitement and awareness before the event.
To keep festival attendees in the know throughout the night, Carmichael Lynch, Northern Lights and Pixel Farm Digital have created a mobile application called Northern Spark. The app offers a map of exhibits and Nice Ride bike stations. It will also show which exhibits are socially trending and gaining the most traction from visitors. Users are encouraged to check into events they attend through the app, which will be available for iPhone and Android mobile users by the end of May.
About Northern Lights.mn
Northern Lights.mn is an interactive media-oriented, arts agency from the Twin Cities for the world. It presents innovative art in the public sphere, both physical and virtual, focusing on artists creatively using technology to engender new relations between audience and artwork and more broadly between citizenry and their built environment. To view a map of the Northern Spark festival or see a complete list of artists participating in the 2012 event, visit http://2012.northernspark.org/ or connect with Northern Spark on Facebook and Twitter.
Northern Spark is supported by
Carmichael Lynch, Cynthia Froid Group, Dominium, Le Meridien, the city of Minneapolis, Mpls St Paul Magazine, Art Works, Nice Ride, Pixel Farm Digital, Prairie Vodka, Red Stag Supperclub, Smaby Family Foundation and The W Minneapolis.
