Pride, Work and Necessity of Side Projects: The Drakes’ Bright Night Project

What are you working on—on the side?

The Bright Night Project started as a simple wine-fueled idea to have an art exhibition in the dark. It then grew into a 4-month epic project that ate all our evenings, weekends and spare moments. A collaboration between myself, Leigh-Anne Drakes and the solar-powered lamp Little Sun. We selected 23 South African artists, illustrators and photographers. Each was tasked with creating an original work around the theme of light.

In order to fund the exhibition,...