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Artistic Licence and Pump
Artistic Licence (UK) Ltd has supplied Quo Vadis with Colour-Tramp and Art-Net products for ‘Pump’ – a project using light and part of the A13 Artscape Project in East London.
Architect Tom de Paor has been commissioned to improve the environment of the congested, hostile landscape of the A13 by the London Boroughs of Barking and Dagenham, and in collaboration with artist Clare Brew he created ‘PUMP’, a polished concrete structure 6.4m high and 4.2m square. The illuminated monolithic structure is so named because it is the new water pumping station built on the site of the former red brick Edwardian building.
Embedded in the concrete structure are 456 LED luminaires connected to Acrylic Rods that create spots of light, 50mm in diameter, which can produce any colour at any brightness. An Artistic Licence 2048 channel Colour-Tramp lighting control system is used to individually control each luminaire. Colour-Tramp is a very powerful lighting control system, recently installed to control the Broadgate, Finsbury Avenue Square LED display, which recently received the 2004 IALD Lighting Design Award of Excellence.
Colour-Tramp 2048 outputs 4 universes of DMX512 via Art-Net. This is distributed via a combination of Artistic Licence Art-Net Ethernet distribution products and DMX512 RDM splitters to provide control of the 456 individual luminaires.
Programming of the lighting system is an integral part of the overall concept of Pump. The current programme has a life of 30 years, subtle changes in the lighting sequences will become evident through the longevity of the project. The framework for the lighting program is a matrix of four vertical, six horizontal and two shorter vertical lines, combined with a palette of 12 colours corresponding to the months of the year.
Each month Pump uses three of the 12 colours: the current month’s colour, the previous month’s colour and the next month’s colour. Additionally, at 05, 15, 25, 35, 45, and 55 minutes past the hour, a single coloured dot chases around the building. This is then chased by successive dots with variable timing to give the illusion that they are pursuing the original dot around the building.
At 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 minutes past the hour, white lines fade in and out, horizontally and vertically, for one minute. Each time it happens in any given hour the sequence of lines will be different.
These lines are the heart of the structure. At the top of the hour, the letters of the word Pump fade in and out over the course of one minute. The letters are hard to read up close, but are more visible from further away. Pump is both beautiful and simple. It appears calm, a refreshing change from the hectic modern LED advertising billboards from which it derives its technologies.
It can be seen by people crossing the A13 back to the local housing, by local traffic, and, briefly, by cars on the A13. It is on the corner of a small park, which has been landscaped by Tom de Paor with reptile-shaped grass mounds. These mounds may well provide the best vantage point for sitting down and watching Pump go through its many cycles. The work marks the beginning of a new era for public art in Barking and Dagenham along the A13 corridor, and it should provide pleasure and inspiration for decades to come.
Project Credits:
Architect: Tom de Paor
Artist: Clare Brew
Original Design and Development of fixtures: Clare Brew
Development and manufacture of fixtures: Quo Vadis
Development and manufacture of LED luminaires: Mode Lighting
Lighting control, distribution and software development: Artistic Licence (UK) Ltd
Lighting Installation: Quo Vadis
Commissioning of Lighting: Clare Brew and Quo Vadis
Photographs: Douglas Atfield
http://www.artisticlicence.com
23rd August 2004
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