An article in the Evening Standard about an art installation opening at the Bargehouse on Southbank from 9th April. It is called Speed of Light and is to celebrate the 10th anniversy of broadband. (By collective United Visual Artists and comissioned by Virgin Media). Looks really interesting; i can't find any further information about it, so i'm looking forward to it - I have in mind Leo Villareal style lighting effects / works. should be good.

Leo Villareal

Tuesday 5th January 2010

Leo Villareal (1967, Albuquerque, New Mexico) is an American artist living and working in New York City. His work combines LED lights and encoded computer programming to create illuminated displays. They are very cool and very beautiful, but worryingly transfixing. Especially 'multiverse' displayed at the  National Gallery of Art, washington, DC. :

"Multiverse, the largest and most complex light sculpture created by American artist Leo Villareal, may be seen and experienced by visitors as they pass through the Concourse walkway between the East and West Buildings of the National Gallery of Art.Commissioned by the Gallery and on view until November 2009, the work features approximately 41,000 computer-programmed LED (light-emitting diode) nodes that run through channels along the entire 200-foot-long space. The development of this LED project began in 2005, and the installation created by Villareal specifically for this location began in September 2008."

(http://www.artknowledgenews.com/2009-10-10-01-04-24-national-gallery-of-art-acquires-leo-villareals-major-installation-multiverse.html)

Link to Leo Villareal's website with a video of 'Multiverse'

Barcelona

19th November 2009

Park Guell was where we started today. Designated a UNESCO world heritage site, it is a stunning piece of work by Antoni Gaudi and a unique example of Art Nouveau landscape architecture. The situation of the park on the hill el Carmel in the Gracia district of Barcelona means the views across the city towards the sea are beautiful. The site was initially intended to be a series of 60 plots for luxury houses, with beautiful views across the city and the advantage of clean air. The mastermind behind this was Count Eusebi Guell, who concieved the project based on the English garden city movement ( which is an approach to urban planning where communities are self-contained and surrounded by greenbelts). Guell moved into the only existing house on the site, Muntaner de Dalt House, in 1906, at this time Gaudi also moved into one of only two houses to be built at this stage (neither designed by him) la Torre Rosa. The park was built between 1900 and 1914 and became a public park in 1922, after failing as a residential site. We entered the park at the grand entrance, one of the only planned things to be built, along with two houses, 3km of paths, a hippostyle (pillared) hall (designed to be a market) and beautiful terrace. we headed up the first stairway guarded by the famous mosaic lizard and turned left past the school and saw some archways and pillars in a strange mottled bubbling stone, which gave it a sort of grotto/ lord of the rings kind of feel. We then headed to the main terrace a huge space surrounded by the waving and curving mosaic seat, and with views over Barcelona. The detail of the polychrome mosiacs, made from ceramic pots, tiles and  broken stone, is beautiful, i couldn't help but wonder how long it must have taken. The shape of the seating surrounding the terrace is said to have been designed by Gaudi based on a naked woman sitting in wet clay and the shape her buttocks would leave. The curving style of the bench creates semicircular nodes where people can sit and talk facing each other or in small groups. We then walked through the park following the unusual elevated road and walkways, Jutting out from the hillside, built like viaducts, so providing pathways underneath them and supported by tree like columns. The reason for the roads being elevated is to preserve the nature of the area, Gaudi also used local stone in building the pathways, so as to minimise the impact on the landscape and knit his design into the existing landscape. We reached the top where there is a huge cross and spectacular views across the city and all the way to the sea and the Montjuic area of the city which we visited on tuesday.   

Above and Below: Examples of the mosaic all around the park and the view from the main terrace, across the city.

Below: an example of the sturdy pillars in local stone found in the park.

Below: the viaduct walk and road ways through the park intended to preserve the nature.

We then headed back to the station and to Parc de nou Barris, which is a new park built on the site of Santa creu mental institute, building work started in 1998 and the park was awarded The European Prize for Urban Public Space in 2008. The park spans the distance between Placa Karl Marx and the old Hospital, and negotiates the level change in a series of terraces, separated by retaining banks and connected by ramps, these terraces are shaped as triangles as are most other elements to the park. Roads and paths cut through the triangle features and the main road which crosses through the middle of the park, Passeig de Fabra i Puig, can be crossed by a wide pedestrian bridge, which connects the two sides of the park. there are also vertical triangular structures at points in the park which provide shade and at night, light. These structures are reminiscent of palms bending into the wind, the two arms of the structures which are joined at the bottom then divert from each other to form a triangular head crossed and connected by what look like slats of plastic or fibre glass. The most impressive area, I thought, was the boardwalk which leads you over the pond to the building. the walkway was split into triangular shapes so that at the points where they joined there was a risk factor in crossing from triangle to triangle; this was my favorite area of the park. The overall feel to the park was that it needed some attention, I felt that the design was being let down by the state of disrepair  it was in, which is a shame because I liked the bold use of geometric shapes and sharp angles. Another interesting feature of the park was the interactive fountains at the bottom of the terraces. you had to see-saw on a metal box to make the fountains work; i thought it was a very clever and interesting idea, but unfortunately, like the rest of the park, the area was run down and some of the fountains no longer worked.

Above: The interactive fountains at Parc de nou Barris. Below: The risky boardwalk over the pond in Parc de nou Barris

On the way back to the station we were distracted by a spectacular fountain, which sprayed water up into the air, which then fell and splashed onto a huge rectangluar rusted box on legs and cascaded down to the rectangular pool below, the fountain was complemented by surrounding  geometric shapes and linear planting styles. (Below)

We then headed back to the waterfront and Barcelonetta via Gas natural Headquarters which was a huge very shiny building with interesting but quite clearly private (there were security guards everywhere) hard landscape design. (below)
At the beach at Barceloneta we measured two sections which are drawn and at this link:  http://www.scribd.com/doc/24806432/Sections-Barceloneta

Marunouchi

Tokyo International Forum

30.06.2009

Visited the Tokyo international forum, the building itself is very impressive, by Rafael Vinoly Architects, who won the 1989 International Design Competition, which was the first international architectural competition in Japan. I really liked the Design, the main hall was huge and spacious, the steel beams supporting the roof give the building a skeletal feel. The exterior to the building was also interestingly designed. The plaza leads into the main building which houses two theatres, one of which is one of the largest in the world, over 6000 square metres of exhibition space, several conference rooms, restaurants and shops. The plaza is paved in granite with a large swathe as you walk towards the International Forum building which is paved in glass blocks and lit from underneath which change colour at intervals. The effect of the glass paving give the plaza an identity the minute you step into it, its a very cool effect. There are also trees dotted around the plaza in a way which you do not often see in the UK, seemingly random, but beautiful. And seating in unusual forms of blob- like sculptures imitating stones or actual stones/ rocks, placed sometimes in pattern with each other (eg. a circle surrounding a tree (bottom))  and sometimes alone. The effect of the placement of trees and objects in the plaza, is that the space seems to demand your attention, you can't simply walk straight through- you notice.

Tokyo International forum. By Architect Rafael Vinoly.

Tokyo International forum plaza.

The Micheal Jackson lit paving.

examples of the stones/ rocks and seating around the plaza.

30th June

TOKYO

I arrived in Tokyo in the evening, in time to see all the lights! very impressive. Walked around Ginza, which was one of the first areas of Tokyo to modernise back in the 1870s. It was home of Tokyo's first department stores, and is now a very popular, and classy shopping area. I noticed as i was walking some interesting street furniture and landscape.

Top, an example of some of the unusual architecture around Ginza; very tall as most buildings seem to be in japan -the lack of building space means instead of building outwards, they build upwards. I noticed some very economical uses of space; especcially with car and bike parking in big cities in Japan. And bottom some swanky street lights outside the Apple shop in Ginza, Love the use of a fairly standard shape for a street light, contradicted by the fact that the whole thing lights up. nice.

15th January 2009

Spitalfields market at night

The lighting in spitalfeilds market at night is really quite interesting. There is a diverse variety of techniques used; a wall with lit perspex panels which alternate in changing colours and the glass clad box covering an electrical substation are unique features and there is also strip lighting in the paving and more conventional lighting rigged in the metal rafters of the structure. 

The substation is clad with glass which has engraved into it quotes and phrases from the long history of the market, with writing of Samuel Pepys, Charles Dickens and Peter Ackroyd. Encircling the box is a thin black line, a timeline of the area outlining the area's history from roman times onwards. During the day the box is white but at night it is lit from inside the box and the glass glows in several different colours which change gradually. It was designed by Imagist (design agency) and Jestico + Whiles (architects).

The wall of lighting is a screen made out of fifteen panels lit from the sides with LEDs. it glows purple orange green and blue and all the tones between.

There is also the lift shaft which is clad in panels in a very similar style to the other two lighting features in Spitalfeilds. They are Traxon Mirror 64PXL wash panels, which act like an interactive wall display. 

The overall effect of the lighting in the market is really effective, the old and new apsects of the square seem to compliment each other rather than contradicting each other and the victorian feel of the market has not been lost through using modern techniques in lighting. 

The lighting for the square was designed by Jestico + Whiles and Julian Harrap architects.

Link to MONDO arc (The international magazine for architectural retail and commercial lighting) website which has a GOOD article on the lighting in Spitalfeilds.

29th November 2008

Wembley

I have often noticed the landscaping at Wembley, but never seem to have my camera on me. What i find so fascinating is the way the space is used; it can go from being completely empty to completely crowded and still people use the space in the same way. Also really interesting is the way lighting is used. In the design it seems to have been acknowledged that alot of the use of the arena and the stadium will be at night or in the evening, so lighting is an integral aspect. As you leave the underground station, the huge stadium is directly in front of you, but to the right is a square with paving lighting similar to the lighting in the pavement of Peninsula Square in the East of London. There are strips and grids of small lines of illuminous colour amidst the grey paving, reminiscent of laser beams. the effect this has is quite transfixing.  However there are many other lighting techniques used; below, the fountain display outside Wembley arena, the jets of the fountain are uplit, in these photos the first shows the fountain when the ater isn't shooting up and the lighting is green in the second the water is shooting up and the lighting is purple, but the colours change which creates and interesting feature, the combination of the movement of the water and the movement between colours as well really animates the space.

The most obvious use of lighting in the whole of wembley is the halo of light which hovers over the staduim, it is such an iconic image, and creates such a strong identity for wembley that i think use of  lighting around  wembley almost has to be used as a feature, And is, quite successfully.

The image above is of some glass paving at Wembley very similar to the paving i saw on south bank, with glass paving lit from underneath with blue lights. And above that the iconic halo surrounding the stadium.

The Imax

22nd November 2008

 I recently noticed the landscaping around the imax cinema, on the walkway/ subway through from waterloo to south bank. The  use of lighting combined with the almost jungle like climbing plants give a really different effect which really struck me as i walked through having never really paid much attention to it before, maybe the time of day i was there or the light but it looked awesome.

i found it difficult to capture in a photo but the plants are shown well even if the lighting doesn't look so good.

The lighting is different in each of the subways and also changes from colour to colour, It sounds and probably should be really tacky, but for some reason it looks good. The plants are draped to almost cover the gap, blocking out the daylight and creating a green ceiling, this creates the illusion of the space being enclosed and also enhances the effect of the lighting.

14th November 2008

Peninsula square

I went back to peninsula square to a gig in the o2 arena, and as i had expected the square was buzzing and serving its purpose well. The design of the square was enhanced by the  uplighting of design aspects and also had interesting lighting features running through the pavement. The spire looked hugely impressive illuminated against the sky. The users of the square interestingly seemed to follow very particular movement patterns through and around the square, probably due to the covered walkway which guides you perfectly from the tube station to the entrance of the arena, without much need to deviate.

(Above) Photographs showing the different lighting used at the square at night. The Dome itself has a big impact on the feel of the space and the way the dome is lit was also quite fantastic. There are various screens around the square which help to animate the space in the dark; you can see in the first of the photos above the huge screen with Leonard Cohen on it, advertising for the evenings event, But also there is a screen above the performance stage which is constantly playing advertisements for future events etc. Seeing the square in full use it is actually quite impressive and fits the purpose well, although i felt there could be more seating, as we were meeting friends before we went inside and that highlighted the lack of it to me.

20th October 2008

South Bank, London

Went for a walk along south bank in the evening, really noticed the different types of lighting used along the way. came across a pedstrain walkway under a bridge which had really interseting underground lighting. Glass paving slabs with blue/green lighting underneath, as strips in the normal paving. Pictures below of the bridge and its unique lighting and a view from the southbank at night looking down the river (east). I quite like the paving, as it was quite refreshing to randomly come across something unusual in such an obscure place. i have never noticed it before- possibly you wouldn't notice in day light.