Dear Joan… Penning a new piece for Light Up Lancaster
27th October 2025
We are excited to announce that we will be creating a brand new projection piece and immersive walkthrough trail for Selby Light 2026, taking place inside and outside of Selby Abbey in February 2026.
Commissioned by Now Then! and co-produced with Mediale specifically for Selby, this exciting installation celebrates different stories and the unified feeling of finding home, sparking off from one simple question: How Did You Get Here?
We’ll be engaging local residents to share their experiences with us, creating characters based on their own stories and telling one huge human tale of imagination, belief and personal history.
Find out more here on our website and in the full press release below, including information about participation workshops for local residents.
***
Lead artist for Selby Light 2026 announced
The lead artist for Selby Light 2026 has been announced by organisers. Now Then! who launched Selby’s first large-scale light installation last year at Selby Abbey, have confirmed the commission of digital arts company imitating the dog for the light event taking place over 3 nights in February.
Renowned for fusing live performance with digital technology, imitating the dog have been making groundbreaking work for theatres and other spaces for 25 years. From touring productions to immersive installations, this work has been seen across the world by hundreds of thousands of people.
For the last three years, imitating the dog have worked on large-scale projections and soundscapes for Castle Howard’s Christmas experiences, which saw a record-breaking number of visitors in 2024. They were also involved in delivering several installation pieces inspired by young residents’ stories for 2025’s Otherham Winter Light Festival, transforming local buildings, such as Rotherham Minster, with their projections.
The company are producing a brand-new work for Selby Light 2026 which will see a story projected onto the front of the 955-year-old Abbey featuring characters inspired by local residents. Audiences will then be invited inside to continue the experience which will see the story’s characters come to life in imaginative ways throughout the building set to an original music score.
Simon Wainwright, co-Artistic Director of imitating the dog, said:
“We’re thrilled to be working on a project which can tell new stories in such a magnificent historic setting. We like to try and bring a bit of magic and some beauty into the spaces we make work for and create space for audiences to see familiar surroundings in a new light. We can’t think of a better place to be trying to make this work than the Abbey.”
Launched in June 2024, Now Then! is a creative programme bringing free events and workshops to Selby, Sherburn and Tadcaster, with a particular focus on providing experiences for families and young people. Funded by Arts Council England, North Yorkshire Council and the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, it gives local people more chances to experience the arts, celebrate heritage and come together in shared spaces. The programme is one of the few places in the country to have been given a Place Partnership Award from the Arts Council England through the National Lottery.
Selby Abbey and Selby-based digital media-arts agency, Mediale, are key partners and both worked with Now Then! to host the launch of the programme and the first Selby Light event.
Said Now Then! Creative Programme Director, Tess Farley:
“This is an exciting development in plans for Selby Light2026. A large-scale event like this not only provides a fantastic experience but brings in visitors to the area which in turn positively impacts businesses. We hope the whole community will get behind this ambitious event and get involved in the workshops taking place in December too.”
In order to create characters based on people local to Selby, imitating the dog will be running a series of free, fun and creative workshops where people can share their stories of how they, their families or their ancestors arrived in Selby. They will then be invited to let their imaginations run wild and turn those stories into unique and inventive characters, part-cartoon, part-mythological, which will be animated and projected inside and outside the Abbey.
Ben Mellor, imitating the dog’s Creative Engagement Manager said “the workshops will be exciting, creative and very inclusive. They’ll involve a mix of storytelling, creative writing, drawing, collage, digital art and green-screen film-making. You don’t need any previous artistic skills to take part though, all you need is yourself, and your story.”
To find out more about the workshops, including details of how to sign up, please visit this page on our website, or email ben@imitatingthedog.co.uk.
Over 5,000 people attended Selby Light in March 2025 with audiences describing it as “fantastic, thought-provoking and brave”. The 2026 event will take place on the 26th,27th and 28th February and will be completely free.
latest news
Support our work
If you have enjoyed watching a show or taking part in one of our activities, and would like to support our future work, you can make a one-off financial gift. Please click below.