foto by Robert Brook and Jon May
pursuit of a sensation using lighting as a tool Anca Trestian
Self-portrait of Godfried Schalcken
Light is the creator of the world in the sense that even the most basic activities that sustain life as we know it, need its casting. The discovery of artificial light changed human understanding of night forever, and divulged many of its secrets. Dominated by the fear of the unknown, humans associate nighttime with danger and evil, having their sight obstructed and being forced to depend on other senses. This is why it is thought that night is inhabited by supernatural creatures, monstrous and evil, which disappear when the first casts of light announces the morning. When artificial light was discovered, people started to choose what they wanted to see, lighting bit by bit the unknown, and slowly constructing “the second day� after the dawn. The evil is slowly diminished, lit by more and more advanced lighting fixtures that almost make it banish. Today we have reached the point where, we see not only what we choose but also we are able to choose how we want to see it during the night.
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The illuminated ocean by Motoko Ishii
Natural light displays and accentuates the city. During nighttime, artificial light recreates the urban scenes, stimulating sensations, challenging our imagination in completing the unknown. Therefore darkness, shadows and contrasts must be considered for planning a lighting scheme as essential pawns for a masterful orchestration that conserves the spirit, mystery and charm of the place. As the urban space occupancy increases more and more three problems are raised: illuminating of parks, industrial and business parks and monuments. On one hand the large vegetal masses are most often quite dark during the night, generating “black holes�, insecure areas in the urban environment. On the other hand, industrial parks suffer from the lack of green spaces creating large lit displays that assault the view. Furthermore, monuments are lit as objects, disregarding their surroundings. Consequently, the lighting scheme proposed, would be concentrated on lighting the large vegetal masses, parks, gardens and squares and link the monuments that have an insolated lighting with their
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environment. It would regard low consumption and, by understanding what direction, intensity, color, dynamicity and transparency is appropriate for a certain urban space, it would create a better nocturnal environment that takes into consideration not only pragmatic needs, but is also embedding some important ingredients which are social background and psychological needs that create a different ethnography to the studied area. For creating the balance between light and darkness, the historical and aesthetic factors should be embedded in choosing the need for light and shade. A good example is the underwater lighting memorial in Okinawa, Japan, created by Motoko Ishii in honor of the Japanese combatants that died in the battle of the Pacific War. The installation consists in submerged lighting equipment at depth varying from 4 to 10 m and of more than 1 km length. The coral reef was illuminated this way, serving as a marker for the fisherman. Every city has its own nocturnal identity which is deeply engraved in history. Therefore, starting with the old myths, of every area studied - that explain the apparition of light and how it filled the Earth, changing forever life on this planet – also following each step of lighting sources evolution and the way they were used in each city would reveal not only human ingenuity but also the different cultural understanding of this phenomenon. Taking into consideration this background, the lighting master plan of the city needs to be realized over a period of several years, making an inventory of that site and creating hierarchies that would construct a balanced scheme. The aim is to create a framing of the view that is guided or directed towards a new order in regards to the environmental consideration and psychical comfort by technical means, testing dynamicity, guessing the evolution of further constructions on a vertical direction. Creating this light identity implies studying what types of lighting fixtures can be
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applied by taking into consideration their consumption, materials, new type of rendering for example Holography, structure of light, also understanding the means of fabrication, manufacturing and mass production. Nowadays mass-media became so diverse and present in our lives that we are assaulted by images. Due to over-saturation, publicity is devouring its own content. We are living in a culture of consumption, that presents an imaginary world that is dominated by political and aesthetics. In this fight for territory, time and money, the most important war is the one for regaining the dark. Gothenburg is the second largest city in Sweden, situated on the west coast of the country, constructed on around Gothia River. Due to its location, Gothenburg has become the largest harbor in whole Scandinavia. In 1970’s, the oil crisis, had a tremendous impact on ship industry, diminishing production. Today, only part of the shipyard continues to function, releasing the river bank of its main function. Therefore the city needs redevelopment of a large area that ended not being used. The analytical framework that leads to completing a balanced nocturnal landscape for this city, would have taken into consideration daytime analysis, planes that compose the landscape, circulation paths, the analysis of different surfaces and their boundaries (river banks, empty parcels and constructions, edges of vegetation, water areas). Furthermore, the inventory of building construction and monuments, the large isolated trees and their position, scale and color would contribute in understanding the site needs for nocturnal light. Consequently the program consists in adding and modifying light in the areas that redeveloped, regarding pedestrian and parking light, keeping the beauty of nocturnal ambiance. It will define scenes appropriate for celebration of historic monuments, keeping them linked to their environment. Gothenburg by Night by Rutger Blom
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ended not being used. The analytical framework that leads to completing a balanced nocturnal landscape for this city, would have taken into consideration daytime analysis, planes that compose the landscape, circulation paths, the analysis of different surfaces and their boundaries (river banks, empty parcels and constructions, edges of vegetation, water areas). Furthermore, the inventory of building construction and monuments, the large isolated trees and their position, scale and color would contribute in understanding the site needs for nocturnal light. Consequently the program consists in adding and modifying light in the areas that redeveloped, regarding pedestrian and parking light, keeping the beauty of nocturnal ambiance. It will define scenes appropriate for celebration of historic monuments, keeping them linked to their environment. Generating the symbol of light, one that regards not only to the emotions created to a group of people (formed by light designers or architects and people from other fields of business) would show how light is understood by both parties .
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 01. Bill Poese, 1976, 02. William Y. O’Dea, 1958, 03. James R. Marsh, 1962, 04. F. W. Robins, 1970, 05. Leroy Thwing, 1958, 06. Roger Narboni, 2004, 07. Robert Bean, 2004, 08. Henry Plummer, 1995, 09. Craig Adcock,1990, 10. Juhani Pallasmaa 11. Carl Gardner and Raphael Molony 12. Peter Tregenza and David Loe, 1998, 13. Derek Philips, 1997 14. Derek Philips, 2000 15. Neil Leach, 1999, 16. Junichiro Tanizaki, 2001, 17. Rem Koolhas,1978, 18. Architectural Design,2009, ries”
“Lighting through the years: the light in the darkness” “The social history of lighting” “Colonial lighting” “The story of the lamp (and can dle)” “Flickering flames: a story of do mestic lighting through ages” “Lighting the landscape : art de sign technologies” “Lighting : interior and exterior” “Light in Japanese architecture” “James Turrell: The Art of Light and Space” “The eyes of the Skin” “Light” “The design of lighting” “Lighting historic buildings” “Lighting modern buildings” “The Anesthetics of Architecture” “In praise of shadows” “Delirious New York” “Energies – New material bounda-
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