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Light festival to celebrate and unite community

Alex PopeBuckinghamshire
News imageLimbic Cinema Library Projection City of Codes & Lights 2023, showing crowds of people standing outside a building, with trees, the lights are purple and green. Limbic Cinema
In 2023, the City of Codes and Lights event projected images onto Milton Keynes library

A city known for its "arts, culture and innovation" will host a special light festival to celebrate and unite its different communities.

Hosted by Milton Keynes Islamic Arts & Culture (MKIAC), the theme of this year's City of Codes and Light festival is Constellations of Stars: Echoes Across the Sky.

The group was started in 2002 in response to the September 11 terror attacks in New York, to "overcome societal division", it said.

Anouar Kassim, its founder and creative director, said: "The importance of community cohesion and integration is more valid now than ever before."

News imageCarys Underwood_MKIAC 'Nature's Algorythm' Projection on MK Central Library, showing colourful shapes, on a building. Carys Underwood_MKIAC
'Nature's Algorythm' has been projected onto the Milton Keynes library

The free event, for all ages, will celebrate the work of Islamic astronomers like al-Sufi and Ali Qushji, and visitors could experience the night sky as a collective story that spans cultures and generations, its organisers said.

Every year it has a different theme, and its first event in 2019 linked the work of Bletchley Park's mathematician, Alan Turing, with Islamic art.

"Pure mathematics and algebra derived from that civilisation, so it linked beautifully," Mr Kassim said.

The first event of 2025 will be held later at Bletchley Park.

On Saturday, a large-scale projection by multimedia creative studio Limbic Cinema will illuminate the city library with the story of astronomy, tracing a journey from ancient stargazers to modern discovery, followed by a lantern parade.

News imageCarys Underwood_MKIAC Milton Keynes spelt out by drones, showing different colours and the O in Milton is a red heart. The sky behind is black. Carys Underwood_MKIAC
In previous years a Theatre in the Sky event saw a celestial drone display over Bletchley Park

Mr Kassim said: "People love what we do because it's about innovation, it's about technology, it's about education, it's about STEAM - science, technology, engineering, maths, art.

"Milton Keynes is known as a city of creativity, culture and innovation.

"It's a celebratory event that unifies all society together on an autumn evening.

"It's a moment to look up, together, and rethink our place in the universe."

News imageCarys Underwood_MKIAC Digital Drummers taking part in a past event, in the dark, but lit up, showing five drummers, all lit up, with hates and costumes, walking down a street, with people either side. Carys Underwood_MKIAC
Theatrical performances take place during the event

The festival runs until 22 October and culminates in a series of Centre:MK workshops, designed to inspire young people through coding, mathematics, and critical thinking.

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