UAlbany Honors Adam Frelin's 2017 Breathing Lights at 2025 President's Award for Exemplary Public Engagement

We are proud to honor Associate Professor and Graduate Director of Art & Art History, Adam Frelin today for his outstanding commitment to public engagement. Frelin was recently acknowledged his 2017 President's Award for Exemplary Public Engagement for his work on Breathing Lights with a campus banner.

Discover all featured Community Engaged Scholars.

Adam Frelin and his team were awarded a $1 million Public Art Challenge grant through Bloomberg Philanthropies for which Frelin was Lead Artist on Breathing Lights, a multi-city temporary art installation that involves illuminating abandoned buildings with a breathing effect created with light.

For two months, Breathing Lights illuminated the windows of 200 vacant homes in three upstate NY cities. Warm light filled each window with a diffuse glow that emulated the rhythm of human breathing. 

Through eight months of programming that included more than 100 events, our team set out to give voice to the neighborhoods we were lighting, while facilitating discussions about vacancy, disinvestment and the role that art can play in combating civic issues. 

Breathing Lights was in collaboration with Barbara Nelson.

Learn more about Adam Frelin's work.