Ends Sunday: Salford’s free festival of light art returns

This December, gloomy evenings will be brightened up by the Lightwaves Festival. The programme of digital light art takes over the public spaces of Salford Quays for 10 days. Large-scale artworks on show include an interactive word sculpture by the poet and author Jackie Kay, and a dynamic waterside work of light and sound by Tom Dekyvere. A light-painting workshop will let visitors to make their own images to download. And thanks to a little help from Blackpool Illuminations, there will be characters from sci-fi and children’s TV. To create another artwork, the organisers are asking the public for help. They are looking for the ‘100 Places and Faces of Greater Manchester’, with 10 pictures from each of the county’s 10 boroughs. Portraits can be of anyone you know, famous or otherwise. For the ‘places’, you should capture something iconic about your area, such as a well-known building or landmark. The chosen stills will be illuminated to create a ‘visual story’ of each borough. See the website below for entry details.

Fri 8 – Sun 17 Dec, The Quays, Salford, M50 2EQ, Tel: 0161 876 2106, 12pm – 10.30pm, FREE, quaysculture.com