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The art of lighting

Singapore 27th September 2011

Let’s take a break from LED’s for a change and talk about something else. With the I-Light Marina Bay 2012 art festival on the cards next year, expressions of interest have been sent out for artists to submit entries. I am keen to particiapte again and have a few arrows on my bow for my submission. Today I happened to meet with a passionate lighting designer with his background in stage and production lighting, which reminded that lighting is really an art form.

While I am scholed mostly in architectural lighting I have had my bit of experience in stage lighting, community theatre as well as set ups of larger installations for theatres, ballrooms and performance spaces. With todays lighting technology (sorry, yes LED’s again!) fast developping we find the lighting equipment for stage and architectural lighting slowly merging into similar systems and as a result the lighting techniques and effects. Lighting design techniques applied on stage are now finding their way into commercial archtectural applications and vice versa. The profession of lighting designer is moving that way as well.

Anecdotedly, my first lighting design for a play was sort of a disaster as I had mainly focussed on getting the set beautifully lit (like I would do in architecture) rather then exploring and reinforcing the expressions and emotions carried by the actors. The world is our stage is often said and I believe that more and more this is litterally becoming a reality. While much architectural lighting design is functional by defintion (form and function), the human factor is slowly but surely becoming integral to any design. Well
being, emotion, expression, comfort, mood, are some of the human elements that now have to be considered and I would like to venture that integrating the theatre lighting approach is becoming a must in the lighting design of any architectural spaces…

In Light Watch today one of the longest running musicals in Singapore at the moment; The Lion King. I have to confess I did not yet manage to go see it but it is on my to do list. Still running for another month! I specifically will be watching out for the way lighting has been applied to bring out mood, ambiance and emotional expressions…


Light Watch 171: The Lion King

27. September 2011 by Martin Klaasen
Categories: light and art, Light and inspiration, light watch, lighting and culture, lighting design | 1 comment

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