ART WITH LIGHT AND ART ABOUT LIGHT
My work investigates how little is needed to create powerful experiences of perception and meaning. Working across art, architecture, and light, I develop situations where light becomes a catalyst for reflection, connection, and discovery. The viewer completes the work through their own presence, movement, memory, and imagination.
O’Brien has developed “Light Poetry”, a distinctive artistic practice exploring the poetic, spatial, and phenomenological dimensions of light through performances, sculptures, installations, paintings, architectural interventions, and urban projects. Working across scales—from intimate artistic experiments to city-wide transformations—his work investigates how light shapes perception, memory, emotion, and human experience. What begins as artistic exploration often becomes the catalyst for architectural and urban innovation, translating the poetry of light into the public realm.
O’Brien’s projects have received international recognition, including a 2025 LIT Lighting Design Award for his urban lighting concept “Soundless Music” for the city of Potsdam, Germany. His projects are characterised by an emphasis on identity awakening of place and human interaction.