May 03

Lumonics Legacy Project Aims to Keep Immersive Pioneers’ Vision Alive by Teague Bohlen, Westword

 

Lumonics Gallery and Performance Space on 73rd and Washington…for now.  Photo by Marc Billard

Lumonics Light and Sound Gallery has been around for decades, ever since artists Mel and Dorothy Tanner started working with light sculptures and sound to create immersive experiences back in 1969. Dubbed “Lumonics,” the unique art form was conceived to engage multiple senses — primarily sight and sound — simultaneously, providing audiences a deeper connection to the work and the world around it.

Barry Raphael and Marc Billard became part of the Lumonics artist collective in 1972, when they separately encountered what the Tanners were already deeply into. “It started for me when I walked into the Tanners’ gallery in Miami,” recalls Raphael, who was the first to join the collective. “I was a language arts teacher in Chicago at the time, and a friend of mine was splitting his time between Chicago and working down at Dade Community College. He told me about it, and I went. It was like the ultimate field trip for me. It was an amazing moment, seeing the theater the Tanners had set up and everything in it. My friend was thinking of trying to move it back up to Chicago, but that never happened. I never set out to move to Miami, but it’s just the way it happened. The experience had mesmerized me.”

“And I was working construction at the time in South Florida,” adds Billard. Mel Tanner’s sister was his neighbor at the time, and she’d told him he should go and check it out. It took him about a year to do so, but when he did, Billard says his reaction was remarkable. “Oh, my God,” he says. “I was speechless.” Mel asked him if he wanted to do some work with him. That was the beginning of Billard (along with his wife, Barbara, who passed away in the summer of 2023) working with the Lumonics collective, building many of the pieces from then on.

“It was Marc’s arrival and all his wonderful work that was really the first expansion point back then,” Raphael says. “He was able to create larger pieces with more detail, and that’s what Mel [Tanner] was working for.”

Mel was working with simple shapes before,” says Billard. “When I came in and got my fingers in it, it was able to become very different. Wall pieces and sculptures. New designs. It changed.”

 

Barry Raphael and Marc Billard have helped represent Lumonics for over fifty years

They brought the Tanners’ artistic legacy to Denver in 2008, where it’s resided ever since, and Raphael and Billard are working to ensure that the exhibitions survive and thrive for many years to come. They still put on immersive shows every Saturday night at the Lumonics Light and Sound Gallery, 800 East 73rd Avenue; tickets are still only $25, are limited to a small, intimate group only, and include refreshments as well as illumination. Tickets for that event and several others are available through Eventbrite.

But in terms of the future of the project, Raphael and Billard have started the Lumonics Legacy Project. They hope to raise $30,000 in order to preserve more than 200 Tanner light sculptures, as well as the Lumonics archives, which include collages, sketchbooks, hand-painted 35-millimeter slides, original projector tray paintings, preserved media articles, photographs and an expanding library of music visuals. In addition to raising money for creating a sustainable legacy and future, the crowdfunding effort plans to establish a Friends of Lumonics nonprofit, which will support partnerships to share Lumonics with the world.

“We’re in our seventies now,” smiles Raphael, “and are deeply committed to seeing this work remain accessible for future generations. What was once a collective of seven is down to just us two, but we have friends who’ve volunteered to help us create this Legacy Project.”

Specifically, Raphael hopes that the project will allow Lumonics to bring more than 100 pieces out of storage and work on restoring them, with more environmentally sound and long-lasting LED technologies, while still keeping within Mel and Dorothy Tanner’s original vision.

Raphael says that the final step of the Legacy Project would be for the whole collection and gallery to move one more time.

 

Jan 24

Culture Hopping with the Biennial of the Americas at Lumonics!

Lumonics truly enjoyed hosting the January Culture Hop of the Biennial of the Americas which is based in Denver, CO. Attendees were very appreciative of the light art and the min-documentary/immersive performance we created for them. Thanks to The Biennial for the Instagram photos!

 

 

#BiennialoftheAmericas #Denver #Colorado

 

Dec 25

How We Create the Visuals and Music at Lumonics Immersed

The source material for the projection comes from an archive of imagery that late artists Dorothy and Mel Tanner originated at the Lumonics Light and Sound Theatre in Miami in 1969, and continues to this day in our performances of Lumonics Immersed here in Denver. The Tanners’ light sculptures also play an important role. We think of the art pieces as the “Lumonics Light Orchestra”.


Here are some of the components of the projection:

1. Hand-painted 35 mm slides by Dorothy and Mel Tanner, a process that began in 1969 in the original Lumonics Light and Sound Theatre in Miami, FL and ended upon Mel’s death in 1993. Hundreds of these slides are in our archives and have been digitized. Here are some examples:

 

 

2. Lumonics video productions from 1978 until present that included the late Dorothy Tanner, Mel Tanner, and engineer John Hall, and Marc Billard who continues the productions at Lumonics Immersed and orchestrates the Lumonics Light Orchestra live.

3. Colorado car rides and hikes, from urban to rural areas, which Marc Billard records and produces. Mountains, streams, forests, streets and roads are the source material. Marc then transforms the imagery in production, and adds an original soundtrack. We think of the finished productions as “alchemized nature films”. No AI is involved!

The photos below are examples of some of the source material.

 

These photos are of Marc Billard using his 360 camera with a selfie stick and also his mobile phone camera to record in the mountains of Colorado. (along Peak to Peak Highway and the St. Vrain River):

 

 

This is a 2-minute excerpt from projection at one of the episodes of Lumonics Immersed:
 

 

The music is a collaboration of Dorothy Tanner and Marc Billard (Tanner/Billard) that began in 1994 and ended upon Dorothy’s passing in 2020. Marc continues to produce music for Lumonics Immersed. It is produced using samples, keyboards, and also can include some of Dorothy’s spoken word we call Cosmic Rap.

 

 

Dec 25

Recent Students at the Lumonics School of Light Art

Our recent students for a one-day Sunday session at the Lumonics School of Light Art:
Kennedy is in 7th grade
Adrian is in 5th grade
The cubes cycle through many colors.

 

Kennedy, 7th grade student

 

 

 

Adrian, 5th Grade Student, whose cube hasn’t found the right spot in his home yet, according to his Dad.

 

Their Dad, Fabian, examining the details

Dec 17

Westword Arts & Culture Promotional Newsletter: Enter the Lumonics Portal

This is a copy of the Dec 17, 2025 Westword Arts & Culture Promotional Newsletter from which we are getting a wonderful response. The original had a black background ground and white text.