Spectra
Last night we had an early dinner and then travelled into town.
From Waterloo we walked along the Thames to Lambeth Bridge, crossed the river to the Victoria Tower Garden next to the Houses of Parliament to see/visit 'Spectra' (or Spectra London, 2014 - to be more precise), one of a series of light and sound installations by artist Ryoji Ikeda.
It was spectacular!
Luckily hurricane Bertha had finished causing havoc by then but the wind was still strong and rather chilly. It didn't feel like summer any more!
We enjoyed taking photos and admiring the columns of light shooting up in the sky. (From a distance you only see one beam).
With the sound and the crowd, it felt rather eerie, something in between 'Closed Encounters of the Third Kind' and a cult!
I'll leave it to Wikipedia to explain all about it:
spectra [london], 2014
The London installation consists of 49 powerful beams of light shining together into the sky, accompanied by a soundscape. It was the latest in a series of compositions in light and sound which the artist has conceived with the spectra label, such as data.spectra and spectra ii.
This installation of Spectra was commissioned by Mayor of London Boris Johnson and the 14-18 NOW programme of the Imperial War Museum for the centenary of World War One and funded by the British Heritage Lottery Fund.
It was switched on at the end of the Lights Out event on 4 August 2014, when the lights of many buildings in the UK were turned off in recollection of Sir Edward Grey's famous prophecy that, "The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime."
The installation's lamps were turned off for good at dawn on 11 August 2014, as the installation was only planned to last for one week.
The spotlights used were xenon arc lamps requiring 4 kilowatts of power each.
The array and the sound system was powered by four diesel generators fuelled by vegetable oil.
A crew of thirty technicians assembled, tested and maintained the installation. The soundscape was inspired by mathematical concepts and consisted of pure sine waves.
When we got home, we realised that the beam of light was still faintly visible from here.
From Waterloo we walked along the Thames to Lambeth Bridge, crossed the river to the Victoria Tower Garden next to the Houses of Parliament to see/visit 'Spectra' (or Spectra London, 2014 - to be more precise), one of a series of light and sound installations by artist Ryoji Ikeda.
It was spectacular!
Luckily hurricane Bertha had finished causing havoc by then but the wind was still strong and rather chilly. It didn't feel like summer any more!
We enjoyed taking photos and admiring the columns of light shooting up in the sky. (From a distance you only see one beam).
With the sound and the crowd, it felt rather eerie, something in between 'Closed Encounters of the Third Kind' and a cult!
I'll leave it to Wikipedia to explain all about it:
spectra [london], 2014
The London installation consists of 49 powerful beams of light shining together into the sky, accompanied by a soundscape. It was the latest in a series of compositions in light and sound which the artist has conceived with the spectra label, such as data.spectra and spectra ii.
This installation of Spectra was commissioned by Mayor of London Boris Johnson and the 14-18 NOW programme of the Imperial War Museum for the centenary of World War One and funded by the British Heritage Lottery Fund.
It was switched on at the end of the Lights Out event on 4 August 2014, when the lights of many buildings in the UK were turned off in recollection of Sir Edward Grey's famous prophecy that, "The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime."
The installation's lamps were turned off for good at dawn on 11 August 2014, as the installation was only planned to last for one week.
The spotlights used were xenon arc lamps requiring 4 kilowatts of power each.
The array and the sound system was powered by four diesel generators fuelled by vegetable oil.
A crew of thirty technicians assembled, tested and maintained the installation. The soundscape was inspired by mathematical concepts and consisted of pure sine waves.
When we got home, we realised that the beam of light was still faintly visible from here.