New York Festival of Light Launches First Light Thursday October 24 at the Elizabeth Street Garden

The New York Festival of Light (NYFOL), a non-profit art organization whose mission is to bring to New York City, the beauty and wonder of lighting design, is launching a year-long initiative that will culminate in the city's first annual lighting festival to be held in November of 2014.

NYFOL is the brainchild of Ira Levy, an award-winning New York City-based lighting designer and Liam O'Braion, a producer of large-scale entertainment events. The two have long admired the annual lighting festivals that take place worldwide in cities such as Berlin, London, Lyon, Montreal, and Sydney. The project, which has garnered the support from the lighting industry, is gaining momentum and the idea behind 'First Light' is to give the producers an opportunity show the public a "taste" of the lighting extravaganza the likes of which New York has yet to see.

Some of today's most exciting fine and performing artists working with light are appearing at 'First Light' and include:

· iLuminate - fresh off a run at New World Stages, uses light suit design and control to enable performers to dazzle audiences;

· 3_Search - a group at the intersection of fine arts, science, and technology;

· Nancy Burson - an artist/photographer acclaimed for her pioneering work in morphing technologies;

· Scott Chmielewski of Digital Media Designs - known for their incredible work at the Summer Olympics in Beijing's Bird's Nest;

· Okamoto Studio - an artist collective known for their design and production of sculptures out of crystal clear ice; and others including Matilde Alessandra, Celebrity DJ Donna D'Cruz, Houndstooth, Negin Sharifzadeh, Zero Times Everything - list in formation.