The Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) lights up the sky near the village of Pallas (Muonio region) of Lapland, Finland September 8, 2017. (Photo by Alexander Kuznetsov/Reuters/All About Lapland)

Doesn’t taking a nap in a hammock outdoors sound lovely? Perhaps not when you’re hanging in the air, thousands of feet above ground, between two mountains in the Italian Alps! Which is exactly what these adventurous folks did during the International Highline Meeting in Monte Piana, Italy. (Photo by Sebastian Wahlhuetter Photography)

Club-goers dance at “Morning Gloryville” at the Ministry of Sound in south London August 11, 2015. Morning dance parties with names like “Morning Gloryville” and "Daybreaker" are gathering steam in cities across the world, giving rise to a movement known as “conscious clubbing”. Its founders aim to create the energy and community of electronic dance parties with fruit smoothies and coffee instead of the drugs and alcohol more common after nightfall. (Photo by Toby Melville/Reuters)

Winner. “I took this vertical image in the Quarry Bay district of Hong Kong during the dusk ‘blue hour’, when there was a perfect balance between the ambient light in the sky and the artificial lights of the high-rise residential buildings”. (Photo by Jatinder Heer/The Guardian)

A dejected German Grenadier carrying a machine gun on his shoulder in front of a building on fire during the German retreat in Russia. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 1944

A Hindu woman hold clay-lamp during a ceremony to celebrate Diwali, the festival of lights, at Krishna temple in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, November 12, 2023. The Hindu festival of lights, Diwali celebrates the spiritual victory of light over darkness. (Photo by K.M. Chaudary/AP Photo)

Light is the sole reason why life exists. It provides us with warmth; it allows us to see; it nourishes all the living things on this planet. Many painters, especially the masters of Old Renaissance Period, have recognized the importance of light and its intimate connection with nature and life itself. In their paintings they gave tribute to light, giving the impression that their paintings had a light source hidden within them. Al Hogue, the artist who created the paintings that you see before you, has studied their techniques for many years. As time went by, light permeated not only his paintings by also his life, becoming his sole philosophy.

People walk under a light projection during the Shanghai International Light Festival at a shopping mall complex in Shanghai on September 22, 2025. (Photo by Jade Gao/AFP Photo)