tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1484410156628092992011-12-13T19:57:38.183-08:00PenPalnoreply@blogger.comBlogger11100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-148441015662809299.post-70248615816596353592007-10-06T03:24:00.000-07:002007-10-06T07:22:09.164-07:00Former Beatle John Lennon was shot and killed outside their New York City apartment by a deranged fan Mark Chapman on Dec. 8, 1980.<br />Yoko Ono will unveil the <span style="font-weight:bold;">Imagine Peace Tower</span> in Reykjavik, Iceland, on Oct. 9, which would have been John Lennon's 67th birthday.<br /><br />"This is something that we spoke about 40 years ago," <br />"Our dream is finally coming true." Ono told this week before heading for Iceland. <br /><br />The Imagine Peace Tower is a stories-tall beam of light that will emanate from a wishing well bearing the words "imagine peace" in 24 languages.<br /> <br />The tower will be lit each year from Oct. 9 to Dec. 8, "so it has the feeling of the shortness of life, but the light is eternal," Ono said.<br /><br />Ono, 74, came up with the concept for the light tower in 1965. Lennon was interested, she said.<br /><br />"He was visualizing then that it could become a reality one day," she said.<br /><br />A couple of years ago, Ono decided she needed a place to keep the thousands of wishes she had collected through the "wish trees" she had set up at gallery shows around the world.<br />"I was collecting the wishes for world peace, of course," she said. <br />"I thought: 'I have to put them in a tower or something ... a peace tower.' "<br /><br />With that, she set out to make her conceptual light sculpture a reality. <br />Engineers from Iceland and Japan worked from her design to build a 55-foot platform beneath a 6 1/2-foot-tall wishing well that houses nine spotlights.<br /><br />The tower sits on the coast of the Island of Vioey.<br /><br />Ono said she chose Iceland "because it is a very eco-friendly country" that relies on geothermal energy.<br /><br />"It's very beautiful," she said. "There's a certain strangeness to it. <br />I'd like to say it's magical."<br /><br />The wishes Ono has collected -- about 500,000 so far -- will be buried in "capsules" around the tower, each topped with a tree. <br />"Eventually it will be like a forest," she said.<br /><br />Wishes can be submitted through the Imagine Peace Web site or by mail.<br /><br />"This is the biggest birthday present I ever gave to John," Yoko Ono said. <br />"He would have been very, very happy about it, I know."<br /><br />The two former Beatles Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr will be present as well.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/148441015662809299-7024861581659635359?l=imaginepeacetower.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>PenPalnoreply@blogger.com0