It’s been a week since the first of four sculptures on Willis Avenue was unveiled to the public, and “Born of Fire” continues to light up downtown Perry both metaphorically and literally.

The literal light is the handiwork of veteran lighting designer Mike Lambert. Lambert has worked with the sculptor John Brommel for around 12 years, and has lighted each of his sculptures during that time. Lambert says he’s worked in the electrical industry for 42 years, 30 of which have just been in lighting, but doing the sculpture lighting with Brommel has been the most enjoyable projects of his career.

Lambert believes lighting design for art pieces like the Willis Avenue sculptures is art in itself, as it can give the work a second life in the evening, essentially giving the public two sculptures for the price of one. For “Born of Fire,” he and Brommel paid a visit to Progressive Foundry in Perry for inspiration. “We watched that entire process for a morning, and we began to form concepts of how we want this to appear. We wanted it to not only have the accurate colors, but we wanted to try to imply a little bit of motion. So you’ll see some gently-pulsing variants in the light levels and some color travel and those types of things that occur naturally when molten metal is poured out of a heating crucible.”

To hear more from Lambert, listen to today’s Perry Fareway Let’s Talk Dallas County program at RaccoonValleyRadio.com.