Welcome to Lights Out: Recovering Our Night Sky at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Discover how light pollution affects the night sky, wildlife, and humans, and what you can do about it.
Next to the introductory text panel is a four-foot-square photograph of Earth taken from space. The left half of the planet is in darkness but is studded with pinpricks of light from cities. Just beyond this photo, the wall angles into the gallery, where a series of five pedestal display cases explain how changes in lighting technologies through time led to today's illuminated night skies. To the right of these five object cases is a large reproduction of a stylized painting of an electric bulb, along with quotes that explore the complicated, conflicting, and changing feelings people have had about artificial lights.
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Switching to the right side of the entryway, two small text panels on the wall thank the exhibit's content contributors and list the exhibit's accessibility features, including tactile objects with Braille, a tactile kiosk with Braille and audio description, and a QR code to this descriptive tour. The wall then angles into the gallery and features two photographs, one showing a nighttime cityscape and one showing a starry sky over a rugged landscape. Overhead, large text poses the question "When was the last time you saw the Milky Way?".
The wall then angles away again into a corner. The right wall of this corner addresses the number of people who live under light polluted skies and can't see the Milky Way, illustrated by a pair of photographs comparing the night sky above the same house with and without light pollution. The left wall of the corner leads into the rest of the gallery. Underneath a yellow title reading "Overexposed," a looping 1-minute video with no sound or narration plays on a monitor to show how light pollution levels changed in the United States starting from the 1950s to today.
Within the entryway section is a display of five objects titled "A Brief History of Lighting." The text panel introducing this display reads: "From controlling fire through harnessing electricity, lighting techniques have changed how we experience the night. Since our ancestors' earliest use of fire over 800,000 years ago, humans have devised ways to fend off the dark and extend our activities into the night. With cheaper and more efficient artificial lights, people can use more light for longer periods. In the last century and especially in recent decades, all this light has dimmed our view of the stars."
From left to right, five glass-topped cases on three-foot-tall pedestals cover the technological progression from torches to oil lamps, gas lamps, early electric bulbs, and modern LEDs. Each object case is set in front of a tall backdrop image showing that type of lighting in use. Above each of these mural slices, an angled panel shows a sample patch of night sky. As you move to the right and the newer lighting technologies, the number of stars overhead decreases because of all the light spilling into the sky.
On the right end of the wall is an enormous map of the world at night, with six panels pointing out different human-made sources of lights at night. To the left of the map is a wall panel with infographic images defining different types of light pollution, from skyglow to glare to light trespass. Next are three clusters of photographs and text panels labeled Energy, Safety, and Ecology. The text and images in each grouping explore how light pollution costs energy, reduces safety and visibility, and throws off the biological rhythms of plants and animals. A panel titled "success story" explains how France is taking steps to save money, energy, and the night sky while preserving cultural uses of artificial light.
At the left end of this long wall, a shorter wall juts out at a right angle. Large yellow text appears on the wall's black background. The text asks visitors "How much light at night is enough? For whom? For what purpose? And who gets to decide?"
A fourteen-and-a-half-foot-long by seven-foot-tall map made up of several satellite images stitched together shows the entire world at night, with the Americas on the left and Asia and Australia on the right. Landmasses stand out in various shades of dark blue against an ink-black ocean, and pinpricks of yellow light are sprinkled across the globe. Text overhead reads: "Seen from space, much of our planet glows at night. Where does all this light come from, and what is it used for?"
An accompanying text panel on the wall explains that these lights mark the presence of human populations and illuminate our activities. We use lights to increase safety, extend social connections, and boost productivity. In fact, artificial lights at night are often associated with progress, industrialization, and economic development. But lighting also reflects our choices on what to light and how brightly, revealing differences in our values and perspectives. Lights are supposed to serve our needs here on Earth, but wasted light inadvertently escapes into the atmosphere, making light pollution glaringly obvious from above.
Six panels are placed on the map to illustrate different examples of lights indicating human activity. Each panel includes a satellite image of a specific location and a photograph of a light source. The panels highlight populated areas as sources of light pollution, using the example of the city of Cairo, Egypt, lit up by streetlights and billboards. The web-like roadways connecting cities, such as the highways around Lige, Belgium, are another source of light pollution. Satellite images also pick up lights from human activities in remote places, such as fishing fleets off the Falkland Islands near Argentina, natural gas flares from drilling fields in North Dakota, and illuminated oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. The last panel on the right explores a more complex story about how money, policies, and access to electricity shape the lights around us at night. North Korea looks almost as dark as the surrounding ocean compared the brightly lit, much wealthier South Korea. Meanwhile, some of the wealthiest industrialized countries in Europe are much darker than their neighbors, reflecting a difference in lighting choices rather than economics.
Skyglow refers to diffuse light in the atmosphere scattered from sources on the ground. It brightens the night sky, especially over inhabited areas, and is made worse by clouds, dust, or smog. The accompanying image shows a city skyline in black silhouette, with a dome of hazy orange light glowing above.
Sitting atop snowcapped mountain peaks, an astronomy facility looks out on the valley below and the night sky above. A tall tower on the left side of the image points up to a dark purple, star-filled sky. On the right side of the photo, the Milky Way arches over a white-domed building. The Milky Way itself looks like a band of dark patchy clouds on a stream of peach and violet light. In between the two buildings, where the left side of the Milky Way approaches the horizon, the sky glows with golden yellow light cast by the illuminated towns that dot the valley.
Continuing on the left wall is a series of images and text panels titled "Marine Life," dominated by a six-foot-long by four-foot-tall photo of yellow elkhorn corals spawning at night. A grid of four photographs shows a squid, a shrimp, a jellyfish, and a lanternfish against a pitch-black background, representing just some of the many organisms that migrate to the ocean surface at night and back down to dark waters during the day. The last section of the wall is devoted to a success story about how Florida communities are taking steps to protect sea turtle hatchlings from being attracted to lights from roads and beachfront properties.
This section of the exhibition centers around a theater that brings a dark sky to life. The accent color for this section is bright green, and a green text panel reads: "When was the last time you spent time under a dark, starry sky? Step inside the theater to experience the next best thing. As you watch the stars emerging and attune to the surrounding wildlife, take a moment to reflect and connect with the larger cosmos. Different human cultures interpret the same night sky in different ways, but there are some universal elements to our shared night sky."
A 21-foot-long screen spans the entire back wall, a caption monitor stands at the lower left side of the screen, and there are benches along three side walls of the theater. A mural of a field surrounded by hills stretches across the wall below the screen and up onto the two walls on either side. The mural is slightly offset from the walls so that colored lights behind the mural can glow in sync with the changing sky colors of the theater program. Overhead, a network of small bulbs imitates a starry night sky. These "stars" come on as the mural lights darken and the theater program begins. The narrated theater program lasts for 11 minutes and 47 seconds, including a two-minute countdown period where the theater grows darker as the screen goes from sunset to night. The program introduces night sky sights and sounds at a dark sky park, then compares different cultures' interpretation of the Pleiades star cluster.
This section of the exhibition deals with humanity's connections with dark, starry nights. The accent color for this section is a light blue, and a blue text panel introduces the theme of the section. It reads: "Since our species first looked up, the night sky has been the backdrop to our lives. It has inspired our stories, directed agricultural practices, guided our navigations, and served as a window onto the universe. People throughout history have incorporated the night sky into their cultures and artworks. Even today, we go out to experience the night sky for pleasure. This deep, enduring connection is worth protecting."
On the next wall to the right, a poem called "Advice from a Streetlight" accompanies an image of a streetlight printed on the wall, which appears to spill a triangle of bright yellow light into the corner. Further along the wall to the right, a collection of photos under the title "Solutions Scale Up" features examples of communities (including Smithsonian museums) that have changed their lighting to preserve their night sky. ff782bc1db
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