Projecting lasers from three different locations onto the dramatic rock face of Mount Roland near Sheffield, an innovative group of “passionate dreamers” will light up the mountain and night sky as part of the Kentish Arts Festival.

Dubbed FireLight, the event was trialled last year and will be officially debuting in May 2017, running across three nights as part of the larger arts festival, which incorporates Mural Fest and Inspire Fest.

The laser and light show will be the main feature of the festival, with interest pouring in from around the country.

“We want to attract people to the North West, to the North, and to Tasmania in general,” Kentish Arts Festival president Des Brown said.

The laser and light spectacular was his brain child. A farmer of 46 years-turned-entrepreneur, Mr Brown said the laser light show would become an annual extravaganza, and could eventually tour around the North West, North and West of the state.

This year’s event will be known as the Finance Brokers of Tasmania FireLight Festival 2017, and Mr Brown said organisers were still looking for more sponsors to come on board.

“We had no money when we embarked on this project. We came together as a community, and engaged and harnessed the power of people. It’s a group of passionate, creative, talented people who have made this happen.

“We initially crowdfunded the project, and we really have to thank everyone who believed in it – the pensioners who gave us $10.”

After last year’s test run, the creative team realised there needed to be several locations for the lasers to project from.

Over the three nights, the light show will tell stories of history and Tasmania through animation, set to music.

“This story will be a compression of the events of the North West of Tasmania itself, the plants, animals and people that together form the history of place, from ancient times to modern,” Mr Brown said.

“It will take you through the creation of the majestic wilderness of Tasmania, the long custodianship of Indigenous culture, white settlement, convict culture, the transformation of the modern pastoral environment, and a glimpse into the future of this land.”

The vision will be created as bold line animation, screened on the 3.3-kilometre wide, 1.2-kilometre high mountain, using banks of lined lasers at three locations, beamed at the rock face from different angles.

“It’s an awe-inspiring way to tell stories on a massive scale.”

Alongside the visual aspect, an original composition and soundscape will be streamed live via the internet, and broadcast from regional radio stations.

It will be similar to an old fashioned drive-in theatre, with designated car parks. Guests will be able to tune into the radio frequency to hear the show’s music while they watch the mountain.

“We already have an outdoor gallery in our region, and Mount Roland really is the mural of nature that we have here in Kentish.

“It is painted afresh everyday with the changing weather – wind, rain, fog, sunshine – everyday the colours and shadows are different. It really is under-utilised.”

The inaugural FireLight Festival is just one part of the municipality’s longer arts festival, which includes Mural Fest and Inspire Fest, held in Sheffield, nicknamed the “town of murals”.

This year’s Mural Fest has received record entries in its 15th year, and organisers want that trend to continue.

“Our vision is to have a month-long arts festival in Kentish, and that would incorporate Mural Fest, Inspire Fest and the FireLight Festival. Together they make a strong combination of events,” Mr Brown said. “We want this to really put Kentish on the map.

“We want to attract the best artists in the world to come and compete and Mural Fest, and we want people from all over the country to come and watch the FireLight Festival.”

Mural Fest commences each year on Easter Sunday, with nine artists competing in a public week-long “paint off”.

This year’s theme for Mural Fest comes from a poem by Karen Beattie – 

“The world is a playground, wonderful and wild. What would you see through the eyes of a child?”

The competition is held at Mural Park in Sheffield, and tests artists’ skill, endurance and tenacity, with public eyes on them, time constraints, and often unpredictable weather.

Inspire Fest is open to competitors receiving disability services, and has been running for four years now, off the back of Mural Fest.

This year, with the launch of the FireLight Festival, the overall Kentish Arts Festival will be bigger than ever.

Mr Brown said people would not be able to pull up on the streets and roads around Sheffield, but would instead have to purchase tickets to designated FireLight car parks to view the show.

“Last year, for the trial run, people were pulling up on the streets to watch it, but we can’t do that because it’s dangerous. This year’s event will have traffic management and people will have to purchase tickets to watch it.”

Mr Brown said the creative team and all the supporters and organisers behind the FireLight Festival were the reason the show has been able to come together.

“We’ve also had great support from the government, the Kentish Council and talented people who believed in it.”

The creative team includes director Kim O’Connell, animator Dean McInerney, composer Dean Stevenson, and the laser technicians at Genius Laser Technology.

FireLight Festival will run on the evenings of May 4, 5 and 6, and tickets will be available online and at the Kentish Visitor Information Centre.