Mountain water melting from glaciers is crucial to the areas's ecosytem but is now in jeopardy.
ADVERTISEMENTThe biggest light festival to be held in the Alps lit up the Italian town of Bressanone on Friday.
Installations by 24 international artists on the theme of water turned the town into an open-air gallery, while highlighting the dangers of climate change.
Bressanone sits at the border with Austria, where the rivers Eisack and Rianz meet. Mountain water melting from glaciers is carried by the two rivers to the Dolomites area, and is thus crucial to the ecosystem – but climate change is jeopardising this precious resource.
The Alps are beginning to experience extreme meteorological events, such as more frequent floods and avalanches, and according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) the melting of the snow is forcing animals to live higher and higher in the mountains.
Artist Stefano Cagol Rivers installed his neon sign reading "Ice melting ice" on the banks of one of the city's rivers, hoping that it will make people think about water.
He said: "These glaciers, they go, they go! Probably soon, I don't know, 100 years or something. And this is why I wanted to have this sign, with light in the middle of these two rivers. To remember and think about."
Artworks displayed in the city also focused on the importance of the moon and the tides, and on the role of water in human history.