BEAUTY: Dioramas For Halloween--GlassdomeGift

GlassdomeGift is a family-owned and run workshop who make charming miniature scenes under a cloche (glass dome) of locations from the Harry Potter series. And they light up! Take a look at the Ravenclaw, Slytherin, and Gryffindor Common Rooms as well as the Herbology classroom.

You can buy your own at the GlassdomeGift Etsy shop:

https://www.etsy.com/shop/GlassdomeGift

BEAUTY: Dioramas for Halloween--ChimericalReveries

These spectacularly realized dioramas by Andy Acres of ChimericalReveries are perfectly spooky for Halloween. The precision of these eerie tableaux need to be studied so, like any good piece of narrative art, the story arc can assemble itself in the mind of the viewer.

Top to bottom: Derelict Farmhouse; East London, 1880 - That carriage doesn't belong on these streets; Haunted Mansion Conservatory; Mistley Hall; Oh, Mother; Taken Back in 1884; The Other Women - A Filthy Shade of Hollywood; The Witch, banished in 1861; title unknown

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChimericalReveries

Coming Soon: The Illuminated River

Light artist Leo Villareal, who created the spectacular The Bay Lights on the Bay Bridge in San Francisco, is lead artist for the winning team of a design commission competition to light all 17 Thames-spanning bridges in London.

The Illuminated River site states the concept:
"Leo Villareal, the artist who created The Bay Lights (a monumental public art installation on San Francisco’s Bay Bridge), architects Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands and curators Future\Pace present a transformational artwork, in three stages, designed to enliven the Thames using dynamic light. First, Villareal’s ambitious composition integrates light and colour on the 17 bridges, from Tower Bridge to Albert Bridge, creating a sensitive, interactive and site-specific interplay with the river. Second, a strategic scheme along both banks will control commercial lighting and introduce the setting for future cultural projects. Third, additional proposals include a ground-breaking partnership between the MBNA Thames Clippers and artists Random International, immersive installations by Japanese technologists teamLab and other opportunities that foster community and diversity."

I can't wait to get back to London to see this!

http://illuminatedriver.london/
http://villareal.net/

Porta Estel-lar

This interactive art/theater collaboration between Eduardo Cajal (owner of the air plane), Playmodes, and MID (Media Interactive Design) takes audience members on a six-minute journey to outer space and other dimensions using state of the art lighting and sound. Entitled Porta Estel-lar, it was installed in Spain in the Ciutadella Park during the Barcelona local holidays of La Mercé, September of 2015.

Sun and Blue Skies...ANYWHERE

Since the atmosphere of our little planet is made up of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, and 1% other gases, the sunlight that passes through the atmosphere has a very specific and identifiable quality and color...and creates our familiar and comforting blue sky. And now, physicist Professor Paolo Di Trapani of Insubria University at Como, Italy has created a revolutionary technological discovery that brings sunlight and blue skies to any space, no matter where it is. Even underground. After a decade of research and development, Professor Di Trapani uses an LED light source filtered through several layers of nanoparticles (which function as the layers of nitrogen, oxygen, and miscellaneous gases in our atmosphere) to mimic exactly the sun as an orb of light in a blue sky. The results are simply jaw dropping--look at the photos below that CoeLux assures us are not Photoshopped. They are raw photos of the actual product.

In November 2014, CoeLux was crowned “Light Source Innovation of the year” at the Lux Awards, and rightly so. The implications for this invention are staggering and will change interior architecture forever. Subterranean homes and businesses, parts of the world that don't see much sunlight for reasons of latitude or pollution, or areas of buildings where a roof line or second story will not permit a skylight will all benefit tremendously from this marvel.

CoeLux is currently offered in three levels, each with a regional, or geographical cast. CoeLux 60 creates sunlight at a 60 degree angle to create near-equatorial tropical light. For light with a Mediterranean feel, CoeLux 45 delivers a 45 degree beam. And CoeLux 30 features a 30 degree angled beam of light reminiscent of Nordic light. But the company is at work producing a commercially feasible version for regular applications.

Watch this short video about the product. It is just mind boggling...keep in mind that you are not seeing sun and sky but an artificial light source that seems to be anything but.

http://www.coelux.com/

BEAUTY: Design--Mathieu Lehanneur

Designer Mathieu Lehanneur's imagination and vision are amazing. He has created objects, furniture, installations, products, stores, but it was this light that first caught my attention. Entitled "Les Cordes," the idea of a chandelier or ceiling light is stripped down into something entirely minimalistic, functional, futuristic, but breathtakingly lovely. The organic-looking cords of LED lights seem to drip from and return to the ceiling plane on their own. And I just love the contrast between this spartan, futuristic sensibility and the Beaux-Arts style of the building, Château Borely, in Marseille. Stunning work.

For Milan Design Week 2013, Lehanneur, in collaboration with Turkish Stones, created a piece called "Liquid Marble," a small shed of a space made of marble with an interior churning "pool" also made from marble. Of the disorienting piece, Lehanneur says, "I hope that, when entering this room, the visitor will experience something that comes closes to what happened to the many characters who opened a magic portal to a forbidden place in so many fairytales. Everything is liquid in this space, evanescent, and yet it is executed in a material that is the most solid imaginable."

And perhaps the most spectacular piece in Lehanneur's portfoilio is the Choir at the Romanesque St. Hilaire Church in Melle, Deux-Sèvres, France. He layered slices of white marble to resemble isobars, put the baptistry in one of the depressions, and used natural onyx for the altar and ambo. Again, the contrast of the ancient architecture with this sleek, modern addition brings a beautiful tension and makes the space vital and current.

http://www.mathieulehanneur.fr/

BEAUTY: Installation--Patrick Beaulieu

In his exhibit for intérieur, multi-disciplinary artist Patrick Beaulieu showed a sculpture of downed birds lit from below by changing LED lights, and a series of images of glowing embers from a fire which were captured on flat-bed scanners before the heat of the embers exploded the glass.

http://artmur.com/en/artists/patrick-beaulieu/for-interieur/

BEAUTY: Photography--Barry Underwood

The magical work of Barry Underwood happens in two phases. First, Underwood employs various types of lighting (LEDs, glow sticks, rope lights, plain light bulbs, etc.) in outdoor locations and photographs these installations. Then he displays the photographs as works in themselves, documenting the ethereal glow on streams, in fields, or even at urban construction sites.

Top to bottom: Aurora (Green); Lightning Bugs; Orange Stream; Parade Field; Trace (Blue)

http://www.barryunderwood.com/