Columbia's Lincoln Street Tunnel is getting a new look this week, as the Congaree Vista Guild prepares to unveil Rainbow Forest, a light-based art installation designed by Vancouver artist Jill Anholt. The piece debuts Friday at 5 p.m., transforming the passageway between the Vista and Finlay Park into what organizers describe as an immersive experience of light, shadow, color and movement.
According to WIS News 10, the installation draws its inspiration from an unlikely natural source: tree resins leaking into standing water in a flooding bottomland hardwood forest, which can produce spectral colors and striking shadows under certain light. Anholt said the layered panels in the tunnel will echo that effect, showing plants, water and other elements appearing within the artwork as visitors move through pools of light and pools of darkness. Anholt, who said Columbia has abundant public art, is the artist behind the project.
The unveiling caps roughly two years of planning. The Congaree Vista Guild secured approval for the lighting project in fall 2024 with help from a $150,000 private donation, according to the Post and Courier. Officials then selected Anholt in early 2025 to design the piece, and the outlet reports the Guild expects the installation to be finished this fall.
A 600-Foot Walk Through Light
The finished piece is expected to stretch 600 feet through the tunnel, per the same report, with lighting intended to improve visibility and safety along the route as much as its visual appeal. The tunnel itself connects the Vista district to the recently reopened Finlay Park, and organizers have framed the lighting project as a way to encourage people to walk the route in both directions rather than just drive past it.
That connective function matters because the tunnel also serves as the entryway to the Vista Greenway, a nearly two-mile trail linking Elmwood Cemetery to downtown Columbia, the Post and Courier's earlier coverage notes. The tunnel opened in 2017 as part of a Leadership Columbia project, and the push to dress it up with art has been building ever since.
One Piece of a Bigger Vista Makeover
Rainbow Forest is one of three public-art projects the Congaree Vista Guild and the Vista Neighborhood Association have been advancing for the tunnel corridor, alongside murals and a planned gateway entrance. The Post and Courier reports the projects are funded through a mix of hospitality tax revenue and private donations. Because the installation occupies a public right-of-way, final approval rested with Columbia City Council, which is reflected in city records: a resolution titled Approving the Installation of a Public Art Project in the Lincoln Street Tunnel, dated January 8, 2025, according to the City of Columbia.
The mural component of the broader effort, covering the tunnel's north end, was expected to cost roughly $20,000 and be funded by a city hospitality tax grant, with completion projected by April 2026, according to WLTX. That project is led by the Guild alongside One Columbia and features murals from local artists paired with interactive lighting, the station reported, with organizers saying the work would beautify the area and showcase local talent. Separately, a sculpture called Traverse, created by artist Clark Ellefson, was recently unveiled on the tunnel's south side, commissioned by the Vista Neighborhood Association in partnership with the Guild and One Columbia for Arts and Culture, according to the Columbia Daily.
Anholt's Light-Based Art Elsewhere
Anholt's selection for the Columbia commission follows decades of similar public-realm work. She has been creating site-specific installations since 1998, and one earlier piece, Sea Change in North Vancouver, uses LED lights and mirrored panels to project refracted, watery light patterns onto a tunnel's surfaces, according to the North Vancouver Recreation Commission. That installation responds to passing pedestrians and cyclists by triggering a cascading wave of blue and green light along the wall, part of a North Shore public-art collection that spans more than 200 artworks. Columbia organizers had also looked at Birmingham, Alabama's Rainbow LED Tunnel as a comparable project while planning the Lincoln Street effort, per the Post and Courier's earlier reporting.
With Rainbow Forest set to switch on Friday at 5 p.m., the tunnel joins a short but growing list of Vista-area art meant to pull foot traffic between the entertainment district and Finlay Park. Whether the murals and gateway entrance arrive on the timelines organizers have floated remains to be seen, but for now, the glowing panels are the headline act.
