John Lennon's Birthday: Yoko Ono Imagine Peace Tower Lights Up

by candice.tsuei | October 9, 2009 at 09:29 am

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Yoko Ono, the renowned artist, musician, and peace activist, is in Iceland today to light the Imagine Peace Tower, a work of art that she dedicated to the memory of his late husband, John Lennon. A virtual-world lighting will also be taking place online in Second Life today for the first time.

Every year today, Yoko Ono visits Videy Island in Kollafjordur Bay near Iceland's capital city, Reykjavik, to light the Imagine Peace Tower there in honor of John Lennon's birthday. This year, to celebrate the Tower's third year, Yoko Ono is offering free ferry trips to the island today and throughout the weekend.

The Imagine Peace Tower is a huge "tower of light" projected from a white stone monument that has the words "Imagine Peace" carved into it in 24 languages.

The tower of light consists of 15 large searchlights surrounded by a number of prisms that act like mirrors, reflecting the light vertically into the sky, usually reaching an altitude of at least 4000 meters.

Guests are encouraged to write their hopes and dreams Yoko Ono's "Wish Tree" which is buried underneath the wishing well-style tower. Over the years, the "Wish Tree," another art project dedicated to John Lennon, has had over half a million wishes from people all around the world.

This year, Yoko Ono is also inviting everyone to a free John Lennon memorial concert taking place at Hafnarhusid in downtown Reykjavik on October 9 at 10 p.m.

The Imagine Peace Tower will shine every night until the 8th December – the anniversary of John Lennon’s assassination.

In addition to the annual lighting of the Tower in the real world, Yoko will also unveil a new Imagine Peace Tower in Second Life, an online virtual world, at 10:30 p.m, and mark the first day of the Imagine Festival in Second Life.

The Imagine Festival site, located 999 meters above ground level in the Four Bridges North sim, contains an ever shifting array of animated figures and lights created by AuraKyo Insoo and artists including Alizarin Goldflake, Apollo Reinard, Artistide Despres, Bryn Oh, Cogito Ultch, Eshi Otawara, Gary Kohime, Glyph Graves, Misprint Thursday, Rob Balder, Sabrinaa Nightfire, Sene Kappler, Spiral Walcher, and UB Yifu.

Schedule for the Imagine Festival events
Yoko Ono's Imagine Peace Tower

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