From Extreme Light to Total Darkness: The Dramaturgy of Organised Light

The discussion of illumination is continued and extended in Chapter 3 where we explore the development of outdoor lighting systems, large-scale projections, and light and video displays in installation works exhibited in gallery spaces. We draw on Sean Cubitt’s idea of ‘organised light’ (Coherent Light from Projectors to Fibre Optics, Open Humanities Press, London: 2015, 45) as the functional ability to focus and amplify light in parallel with developments of the technologies of luminescence in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. We argue that these developments predicate a complexity of aesthetic and political relations that have bearing on histories of urban space, political economy, and ideas of community and nationhood. Our discussion touches on both the rise of spectacular lighting events at expositions, civic events and world fairs, as well as case studies by artists including Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, dumb type and Ikeda Ryoji. The chapter comes full circle in a discussion of Verdonck’s Stills, a large-scale work projected onto the sides of buildings in post-austerity Athens in 2015. The early termination of this work at the behest of the authorities created a media frenzy, and our analysis in this chapter shows how these manifestations of public lighting incorporate and extend technology to draw attention to an idea that also concretises political actions.