Exploring “Lights Out”: The Smithsonian’s special exhibit on reclaiming the night

When you step into the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, your eyes are immediately drawn to the towering elephant at the center of the rotunda. Majestic and lifelike, this iconic figure, affectionately known as Henry, has become a museum staple—and even a star in Night at the Museum. While Henry always stands proudly in his place, venture up to the second floor, and you’ll discover a rotating hall of temporary exhibits that spotlight fascinating, lesser-known topics waiting to be explored.

Last December, I had the opportunity to meet with Juliana Olsson, one of the museum’s exhibit writers, and walk through the Lights Out: Recovering Our Night Sky exhibit. At around 5:00 pm on a Tuesday evening, the museum was closing down, visitors dwindled, and we had the space to ourselves. At first glance, the hall that hosts the Lights Out exhibit is dimly lit, a stark contrast to the neighboring gemstones exhibit with bright colors adorning the walls. For Lights Out, the promotional banner is simple, an image of the dark sky with what seems like thousands of light specs as stars, glowing in a purple and blue cloud above the lettering. 

Depending on which entrance you choose to take, the exhibit introduces (or re-introduces you) to the night sky either through a historical or personal perspective. As we walked into the exhibit from the entrance facing the rotunda, we were met with a brief history of manmade light, from torches to gas lamps to electricity. Each display is juxtaposed with the growing effect of light pollution associated with that technology. The pieces used in these displays are from the natural history collection as well as the Smithsonian National Museum of American History collection (visitors can pop next door to see the Lighting a Revolution exhibit on electric lighting). Its purpose? To introduce people to the growing problem of light pollution, and how we got where we are today.

Slowly, we wandered through to the next section about light pollution’s impact on astronomy, curated by Smithsonian astronomer Dr. Kim Arcand. Astronomers were among the first people to sound the alarm about light pollution and this section of the exhibit speaks to how observatories are having to move to increasingly remote locations as light pollution affects viewing conditions. This story is told through three Smithsonian-affiliated locations: Harvard College Observatory (where Harvard & Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics is now located), Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory, and the Giant Magellan Telescope. 

Opposite from this astronomy nook, the section titled “The Dark Side of Light” gives context for the issue of light pollution, stepping away from the obstruction to astronomers and to the unintended consequences such as energy consumption and safety concerns. As you continue to make your way through the exhibit, brightly-colored questions, quotes and phrases stand out against the dark walls, constantly provoking thought. Framing questions like “Who has the right to the night sky?” allows visitors to grapple with the answers and have the conversations themselves. 

For the section on natural history impacts, Juliana broke down the four focus stories: Marine life, Bats, Insects, and  Migratory birds. And each section is full of specimens, photos, and informative captions to include a photo collage of nocturnal life, and a text rail that explains why humans need the dark too. Artificial lights can affect species in different ways, so the curators chose to show a wide range of species and the individual effects that make studying the issue of artificial light even harder to study and to predict. Success stories feature communities that have banded together, for example opting to turn off lights downtown during peak bird migration or installing sea turtle-friendly lighting along beaches, showing that communal action makes a difference. 

As I stepped into the small theater, Juliana told me that they wanted to replicate a dark sky experience. The movie runs as the sun sets in Coudersport, PA, a certified Dark Sky site, and follows the same star cluster through multiple different locations and cultural interpretations around the world, moving you towards the cultural section of the exhibit. Here, the curators of the exhibit wanted to partner science and storytelling, grabbing the attention of the audience by relating lore from different cultures and locations. The story follows the star cluster Messier 45, a popular star cluster known by many names worldwide. In Greece it is known as the Pleiades. The Ainu of Japan have many names for it, with one of the stories being about a family of six lazy sisters who run away from working in the field. And finally, in New Zealand, the Maori call it Matariki; its rising just before sunrise in the winter months marks the new year.

Leaving the theater, on your right you are met with a photoshow of the night sky, featuring photos of the Milky Way from all over the world. Accompanying a large jaw-dropping image of the Milky Way over Zion National Park, is the quote “When was the last time you saw the Milky Way?” While the quotes throughout the exhibit feature renowned authors like Paul Bogard, the displayed photos were curated through a partnership with the network of photographers at The World at Night (TWAN), such as Babak Tafreshi. Juliana explained to me how the highlighted anchor images came mainly from TWAN, showcasing locations around the world such as Pic du Midi Observatory in the French Pyrenees. Other images are meant to show that we don’t have all of the answers, whether that is in the terms of satellite constellation regulations or protecting Indigenous spaces during the construction of telescope sites. Placed beneath highlight photos in each section, you can also find a placard below each photo, you can see the specific specs and how each image was taken, an important addition as most dark skies are seen in grayscale without photo correction, and what your naked eye sees will not reflect the cotton candy entourage of color that the camera can detect. 

My favorite piece of artwork in this exhibit hangs on a wall at eye level as you walk out of the theater towards the back. It’s a commissioned piece of artwork by Margaret Nazon, a Gwich’in artist from Canada’s Northwest Territories who uses traditional beadwork to render untraditional subject matter such as the Milky Way. This night sky beadwork imagery (now a part of the anthropology collection at the museum) proves to viewers that native artists and art styles are not only timeless in tradition, but relevant and current. The way that Juliana describes the pieces and content of this entire section still echoes with me, that cultural “big buckets” such as beliefs, science, and storytelling can be found in various traditions such as wayfinding in native cultures. 

An exploratory space of the exhibit is tucked into the back corner, a big mural of a fictional community, where visitors can visualize and play a version of Where’s the light? akin to Where’s Waldo? to see what you would change for good lighting practices. This area shows how solutions scale up from personal purchases like bulbs and shielded fixtures to community action taken by towns like Flagstaff, AZ and Bisei, Japan. 

At the other end of the exhibit is the second entrance, which starts by giving a personal perspective on light pollution. This other entry uses the Bortle scale (a way of classifying night sky artificial brightness) to ask visitors what their night sky looks like as a way to get them to think about why a rural night sky might look different from an urban night sky–basically, how light pollution affects your view. The accessible interactive goes with these Bortle scale images, translating the pictures of the night sky into textured graphics, sonification, and an accompanying visual description. Accompanying the Bortle scale, there is also a feature of data sonification, a tool that’s used by blind astronomer Dr. Wanda Diáz-Merced. 

Leaving the exhibit, you get the message loud and clear…we must protect our night sky, so what’s next? Walking away from the exhibit and my afternoon with Juliana, I found myself planning my next trip to a Dark Sky park to stargaze and jotting down ideas for this article. I even stopped to snag a quick picture of the map of International Dark Sky Places in one of the final sections titled “Embracing the Dark”, making sure to read through the tips and tricks on how to enjoy the night sky (such as how to find darker spots, tips on what to look for, a map of dark sky sites, and tips on astrophotography and citizen science programs).As a Dark Sky Advocate, I hope that people will take similar inspiration from the exhibit by reaching out to DarkSky chapters in their hometowns and taking more time to see what you can do to see the night sky in their little slice of Earth, wherever that may be. 

Related Links: 

https://naturalhistory.si.edu/exhibits/lights-out

https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/facilities-technology/cfa-facilities/fred-lawrence-whipple-observatory-mt-hopkins-az

https://global.si.edu/projects/giant-magellan-telescope

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