PHILIP RAFAEL

ARCHITECTURAL LIGHTING DESIGN STUDIO

[philiprafael]

Suspension of Disbelief

Some time ago, colleagues of mine brought to my attention an old theatrical concept: Suspension of Disbelief. The team was using the concept to help support a number of design decisions that had been made in a project.

English writer Samuel Taylor Coleridge coined the term in the early 19th centenary to describe one’s willingness to suspend their critical faculties in order to allow themselves to briefly believe in something surreal. It is a sacrifice of logic and rationality for the sake of enjoyment and pleasure.

When we read a novel, listen to a story, watch a film, etc., there is something taking place in our minds that allows us, for that brief duration, to fall into a world of imaginary. In other words, we’re willingly ignoring our basic understanding of reality because our desire to become part of whatever imaginary world is being laid out in front of us is too great.

A good example of this is Peter Pan in the play ‘The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up’. Anyone who watches the play does not truly believe that Peter Pan can fly. We also do not believe in magic and we understand the science behind gravity well enough to know that the storyline is fictional and not real. Yet, at that moment when we are in the theatre watching this eternal boy fly with the help of fairy dust and happy thoughts, our desire to engage with the story supersedes all. We are willingly suspending our disbelief despite having clear sight of the suspension cables that the actor is using to swing over the stage. We are choosing to ignore them because we want to believe in the fantasy of the story.

It seems clear to me that Suspension of Disbelief is, for the most part, an internal process. However, I also suspect that ones’ surroundings, or more importantly the lighting environment we find ourselves in, can facilitate this process. 

To return with the example of the play Peter Pan, one could argue that our suspension of disbelief is a far richer experience when the lighting hierarchy and brightness composition of the theatre has dimmed the auditorium wall lighting down to a point where we forget the walls are even there. The lit environment is allowing us to ignore the wall and focus on the main character. We could ask ourselves how engaged would we be if the stage lighting rather focused on the contraptions and suspension cables that allowed the actor to swing from one end of the stage to the other. We would probably find it quite distracting from the story.

Another example that comes to mind is the saying: a room that is well daylit and painted with light colours will feel ample and larger than it really is. I think this provides us with a hint towards the crux of today’s thought experiment. What is lighting environment doing to make the room feel ample if the room’s dimensions have not physically changed?

Our willingness to suspend our disbelief is influenced greatly by what the lighting design is revealing and concealing from us. What is happening in the bright room is that there is more to see, not that the room is larger. It is also possible to flip this on its head and ask what do we experience when we selectively conceal. Surely this must have an equivalent level perceptual influence. Once we get our heads around this concept than we start to understand the importance of lighting in the architectural experience. 

Today’s blog is a good reminder that our basic understanding of the world is predominantly visual. Light is what we see and inevitably, it influences how we experience and understand what is around us.

[philiprafael]

Light & Culture

Yesterday evening, I returned from a fantastic holiday in Israel and, like many other lighting designers, I now find myself rushing off to Frankfurt to visit Light + Building. Fortunately for me, Frankfurt is a train journey away, one that is long enough to have some time to reflect on whatever comes to mind, but not too long to become burdensome.

As can be expected, I’m recollecting the many marvellous lighting experiences I was lucky to have had during my holiday, but more importantly, I’m building up my own personal map of the world of architecture and light. This map exists only in my mind and is undoubtedly biased to what I’ve seen of the world. It expresses itself by reshaping borders, and disproportionally increasing areas that have had a greater impact on me, and decreasing areas that have had less or that I haven’t yet had the fortune to visit.

What is becoming obvious to me is that the fictional borders I’m creating with this map are based on my perceptions of world cultures. Needless is to say that there are large blank areas, such as Africa and Central and South America. This doesn’t worry me because, given enough time, I’m confident they’ll be filled in.

This visit to Israel has now given me the confidence to start to detail out the Middle East. However, I think it is important to say that visiting alone is not enough to build up this map. The exercise will require some research of cultural and architectural history, an understanding of current geopolitical affairs, and most importantly cross-referencing this knowledge with what I’ve actually witnessed.

The exercise will most likely take some months but it will be well worth the while and will naturally impact all other lighting impressions that the world has given me. Stay tuned to see how the map takes shape…

Unedited photos from a phone.

[philiprafael]

Light and the Oriental Cultures

[originally published in the ILP Lighting Journal, April 2012]

All built elements and environments have a human nature to it. They are in a way an extension of us and as such, can have human or emotional qualities to them. These qualities only exist in the human mind but none the less, they are important to understanding how people relate to their built environment.

As such, our cultural background has a significant influence on how we see and understand light. This influence is difficult to perceive and many times can only be achieved by comparison to other cultures that differ from ours.

I many times look at the oriental culture as a counter reference to my western upbringing and in my research, I have found that what is often described as ‘oriental culture’ is (not surprisingly) far more complex with a variety of different cultures within it. A good example of this can be found by simply comparing the Chinese and Japanese cultures, both are very different and as such have a different understanding of light and light design.

The Chinese culture is significantly influenced by the Tao philosophy. Taoism is a complex philosophy that is intrinsically related to Yin and Yang (a concept of how the world is built on equal polar forces) but also emphasizes on the tangible and intangible qualities of the universe. In ‘The Tao of Architecture’, Amos Ih Tiao Chang describes the tangible and intangible of architecture as the qualities that relate to its formal and functional language. He explains how its tangible qualities are the formal language to which we relate to, while its intangible qualities such as void are deeply connected to its functional existence.

‘Moulding clay into a vessel, we find utility in its hollowness; Cutting doors and windows for a house, we find utility in its empty space…’.in The Tao of Architecture

The Japanese culture is influenced by the Zen philosophy. Focused on experimental wisdom, it gives insight into one's true nature and searches for what the Japanese often refer to as the emptiness of our inherent existence, opening a path to a liberated way of living. Such emptiness tends to be related to some form of detachment from the superficial.  Although its origins derive from Chinese Buddhism, in Japan it becomes significantly more focused on individuality and beauty. Another differing aspect is the Japanese Ensō. Represented by a circle, ones Ensō represents his true self and differs according to ones’ state, it may be an incomplete or complete circle, have a strong or thin brush stroke. There is no perfect Ensō and to be in Zen is to be at peace with ones’ imperfect self.

This subtle difference between the perfect balance of Yin and Yang with the imperfection of ones Ensō is enough to have a significant influence on how these two oriental cultures see and understand light.

Despite the balance that the Yin and Yang concept claims for, for the Chinese, light does not seem to be part of this equation. It seems that for them, light is a medium to represent their perfect society, a society that over shines the imperfect individual. Light is seen as a single element which purpose is to assist the whole to shine bright demonstrating success.

The Japanese on the other hand search for individual harmony, aspiring to beauty and accepting one's imperfection as beautiful. Japanese Light Designers search for a sober balance of light and shadow, seeing them both as an essential part of beauty. In ‘In Praise of Shadows’, an essay on Japanese aesthetics, Junishiro Tanazaki describes “...the beauty of a Japanese room depends on a variation of heavy shadows against light shadows…”. Mainly focused on beauty, Junishiro claims for a need of shadow as beauty is also what one cannot see, “…the person who would shine a hundred-candlepower light upon the picture alcove, drives away whatever beauty may reside there”.

The Western culture varies greatly from the oriental cultures and as them, we are equally diverse. However, when it comes to light we tend to have a pragmatic approach. For the Westerner, progress is crucial and for that, we seek individual success in order to triumph collectively. Light tends to be seen as a mean to that end - a tool that allows us to extend our activity and increase efficiency - this is why we are so focused on lighting for the task. This functionalisation of light has resulted in a widespread standardisation to ensure that we all can be individually efficient. The diffusion of standards may also be why Western cultures find fewer differences in our understanding of light when compared to our Oriental neighbours.

Despite our pragmatism and standardisation, our cultures are still diverse. We only need to look at the variety of our city centre lights to understand this, the romantic variety of Paris and the Eifel tower compared to the Scandinavian love for long but sober light and shadow from the low sun. Our understanding of light is definitely linked to our culture and searching for these subtle connections is important if we are to design light designs that people can relate to.

Tao (道) is a Chinese word meaning 'way', 'path', 'route', or sometimes more loosely, 'doctrine' or 'principle'.

Ensō (円相) is not only the Japanese word for "circle" but is also symbolises absolute enlightenment, strength, elegance, the universe, and the void; it can also symbolise the Japanese aesthetic itself

[philiprafael]

SKALAR Reflections

“SKALAR is a large-scale art installation that explores the complex impact of light and sound on human perception... SKALAR reflects on the fundamental nature and essence of basic human emotions.” Whitevoid

This past weekend I had the pleasure of visiting this installation by light artist Christopher Bauder (founder of Whitevoid) and musician Kangding Ray. Skalar is an art installation that explores 8 different emotions through the medium of light and sound.

I experienced 4 of the installation’s emotions. Whilst it isn’t obvious to me whether the emotions that were being expressed related directly to any specific human emotion as we understand them, such as happiness, fear or hope, I did interpret them as emotions. This lays the questions: what were these emotions and how did the installation (in other words, the environment I was in) enable me to feel them?

The emotional response a person has to a space is predominantly triggered by light. I believe this to be true. After all, the majority of our understanding of our surroundings results from light reflecting off surfaces, entering our eye and reaching our visual system.

I’m using the word predominantly because I’m willingly ignoring the other senses such as touch, smell, taste and hearing. You could argue that taste is negligible and shouldn’t need to be mentioned; after all, how likely will the taste of anything affect how we feel about the built environment?...

Nonetheless, this is obviously my own bias towards light. I am a lighting designer. My intuition has told me for years that the lighting designs I’ve created influence the emotions of those who experience them. But what I’m wondering now is whether the emotions that are being triggered are well understood by us? I wonder this to the point that I question whether this emotional reaction is so understudied that language is yet to name these emotional reactions to our environments. It’s possible.

Placing the question in this manner somehow sidetracks me to think about those who experience the world through their TV, phone and more recently virtual reality. In the past, I’ve criticised (maybe unfairly) those who limit their experience to these mediums. I’ve claimed that they will always lack real-world sensory experiences. But when you try and understand what is being achieved on a sensory level, even more so with VR, there is something to learn about this transformation of bits and bytes into experiences.

It might well be that VR nerds have a better chance at cracking the original question of this blog than lighting designers and artists. Their sole focus is to artificially recreate real-world experiences through the virtual, and in doing so they've placed themselves in a position that is probably best equipped to understand how the virtual lighting scene influences that experience.

For me, art installations such as Skalar create a sort of augmented sensorial experience that is so impactful that time itself feels slower as you go through the experience. I think it’s important that lighting designers learn from this.

http://www.christopherbauder.com/

http://www.kangdingray.com/

http://www.whitevoid.com/2018/02/05/skalar-art-installation-and-performance-at-kraftwerk-berlin/

[philiprafael]

“The emotional response a person has to a space is predominantly triggered by light. I believe this to be true.”

[philiprafael]

Candlelight? Perfect!

What do you say when a client asks you to design the lighting for their project using candlelight as the main light source? The only answer possible is: Yes, please!

I have to admit that this has never happened to me before. However, the statement needs to be put into context: the project at hand is a luxury resort and the space in question is the bathing area of the single and double villas. So yes, candlelight is perfect!

Today I want to dive deeper into this, that is, try and focus on the why is candle light perfect? At first, this may seem like a pointless question, we all know that candlelight is the apex of “romantic lighting” and for most of us, using candlelight to create intimate environments isn’t really rocket science. You don’t need to be an experienced lighting designer to understand that the warm, dim and slowly moving candlelight can trigger in us feelings of calm and relaxation. The real question is: why does this happen? Why is this reaction to candlelight so common to us? It seems to be consistent throughout all humankind, irrespective of ethnicity or culture.

These questions brought me back to the early days of The Dark Art when we were trying to decipher potential origins to our reactions to light. At the time, we were naturally led down the path of evolutionary theory and found many correlations in our current understanding of the early relationship of the first humanoids with fire.

To cut a long story short, during the early days of human evolution, fire offered us a different relationship to light than sunlight. During the dark, cold and dangerous night, fire was an important source of light, warmth and security. It was a key tool for survival and mastering the use of fire was essential for the success of our species.

Early humans realised this importance and understood that the light from a flame is fundamentally different to the light from the sun. To start, we can control it and this is important because it allowed for us to have a deeper and more personal understanding of it. Fire is usually positioned on the ground or at a low level, meaning that the characteristics of its light and shadow are different to daylight. The most obvious difference being the fact that firelight comes from below and daylight from above. Firelight creates a slightly distorted shadow because of how close we are to the light source and its shifting movement is continuously revealing and concealing our surroundings adding a sense of mystery to what is being lit.

These characteristics were so impactful that we started to develop belief systems around the importance of fire. Zoroastrianism, a religion that is currently still in practice and is considered to be the oldest religion of human history, has fire worshiping at its centre. Scholars also believe that the act of fire worshiping even predates the Homo sapiens species.

What this means is that humankind’s use of firelight even predates humankind and this is the true origin of our close relationship to candlelight. For millennia, we’ve gathered around the campfire with those who are close to us, to stay safe and keep warm, to strengthen social bonds and also to fall in love. This is why our reaction to candlelight is so hardwired into our DNA; this is why candlelight is perfect!

[philiprafael]

Choreography, Asymmetry & Syncopation

A few years ago, around 2014, a little after moving to Shanghai, the idea of a lit Choreographed Experience came to me. The concept came into existence after studying how lighting design has the potential to influence our retail experiences. Essentially, through the use of visual cues and lighting accents, the lighting scene can influence what the eye looks at or pays attention to. It also has the potential to continue to guide the eye to the next point of interest. By composing the various visual cues in a hierarchy, we can influence the order in which they are experienced. This adds an extra dimension to the already existing concept of visual cue as it implies the notion of time, that is, one action will happen only after another.

This past weekend, I went to see a dance performance in a local theatre and as I watched, I found myself noticing how the ensemble changed their overall composition throughout the show. The ensemble was constantly playing with its form, switching between symmetry and asymmetry. This was true not only for the overall composition but also for the individual dance choreography.

The shift between symmetric and asymmetric was very intriguing to me. It created a dynamic feel that made me more interested in the performance. The symmetry created a sense of group stability and balance and the asymmetry added an unpredictability that would grab my attention.

After the performance, I decided to look it up and as was expected, the technique of playing between symmetry and asymmetry is well understood in dance. A fair portion of the art of choreography relies on the balance between the two as an excessively symmetric dance will be monotonous while an excessively asymmetric dance is too chaotic causing us to equally lose interest.

I started to wonder if this could be applied to other disciplines and a technique used in music came to mind: syncopation. Syncopation is when the accent of the rhythm falls on an off-beat in an unpredictable way. This unpredictability takes the listener by surprise and gives the music a certain level of suspense, it plays with the expectation of the beat and the anticipation created by the delay of the actual rhythmic accent. This technique is used greatly in modern music and studies have proven that music that uses syncopation moderately are more danceable as the mind fills in the gaps with movement.

Now back to lighting. The Dark Art has many times expressed that lighting has the ability to play with our expectations and desires. What these two examples are telling us is that what we have previously referred to as desire is nothing more than the anticipation of the peak accent. They tell us that we’re naturally attracted to the play between expectation and anticipation and that this can be achieved by carefully breaking the expected symmetry with just the right touch of asymmetry. I see great potential in these concepts for the lighting design world. Although we cannot oversimplify such principles by trying to directly apply them to lighting, the ability that lighting has to conceal and reveal hints at a potential interpretation of these concepts. I admit that further thought and experiment are necessary but I look forward to experimenting in the near future.

Dance Performance, Symmetry & Asymmetry http://dancehelp.com/choreography/

Syncopation http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0094446 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuvA4b_2pk0

Bruno Mars Syncopation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nK4erl_dqJE&list=PLZTvCA3my3S7Wjhg5dTCB3uPUNelqlqeM

The Dark Art www.thedarkart.org

[philiprafael]

The Feuerle Collection

It’s been a busy month so I was glad when the opportunity came to visit the new museum by John Pawson in Berlin. The Feuerle Collection is a private museum that showcases artwork accumulated over the years by the private collector Désiré Feuerle. The collection consists of Imperial Chinese furniture and Southeast Asian antiquity that is cleverly combined with contemporary art and photography.

The Museum reclaims an old WW2 telecommunications bunker and adds to the already rich portfolio of refurbished bunkers in Berlin. The project was completed last year so there was some anticipation up to the visit and I’m glad to say that the architecture and museum meet and surpass expectations.

For those that have followed my work with The Dark Art, you may know that John Pawson is an important reference of ours as we have used some of his work as positive examples for the use of darkness in lighting design, the most prominent being the Stone House, a temporary installation designed in 2010 for the Interni Think Tank Exhibition in Milan.

The museum tour begins in a darkroom completely void of light. The visitors are warned in advance that they will be entering the darkroom as it can be unsettling for those who fear darkness or who are claustrophobic. The darkroom is a preparation for what is about to come. Once inside, a calming music is played and the tour guide explains that the prelude’s purpose is to help visitors decompress and prepare themselves for the exhibit. The experience is indeed relaxing and lasts a few minutes however I have strong suspicions that there is an ulterior motive to it.

Although the mental and emotional decompression exercise indeed plays an important role in how the museum is experienced; my suspicions are that the darkroom is a preparation period to allow visitors sufficient eye adaptation for the low lighting levels of the museum. The lit environment is quite dark so if visitors suddenly entered from the daylit environment outside, they would be unable to adequately see the exhibit. It’s a touch of genius that also has a tremendously positive impact on the overall experience.

The Dark Room is also the only location where the tour guide intervenes. Besides time control and their availability for questions, visitors are allowed to walk freely and uninterrupted throughout the space. The tour is divided into 2 large rooms without partitions: starting in the basement room where you spend the 1st half, from which you are then transferred after 30 minutes into the 2nd room on the ground floor.

The artworks and objects are displayed without any written information. As explained by the tour guide, the intent is simply that the art be experienced. The museum’s view is that the act of reading is taking you away from the experience itself.

Once inside, what one encounters is an architecture and lighting design that are entirely focused on the objects on display. The room is very dark, almost difficult to see, and even when you do pay more attention to it, the interiors are completely void of finishes and decoration with the original bare aged concrete and building structure truthfully exposed.

Great care was given to the lighting of the museum. It is a project that takes contrast and focus to a new level. Many artworks are lit with precise silhouetted beams, e.g. the photography displayed on the wall is lit with a rectangular beam that perfectly fits the silhouette of the frame. This draws our full attention to the artwork, as there are no distractions with the darkened surroundings.

What pleases me even more, is the great care that was given to darkness. The overall experience would not have been possible in a brighter space. However, it’s not only the lighting levels that are worth highlighting as even the cast shadows play an important role in the lighting design. Many of the spotlights (the ones that are not silhouetted) are positioned in such a way that they cast shadows onto surfaces that contribute to the overall composition. The most obvious example are columns located behind the objects displayed. Because you are allowed to walk freely, including behind the artwork on display, this detail adds another layer to the overall experience.

And finally: the Interior Lake. The lake is reminiscent of the original site conditions as they were found when John Pawson and Désiré Feuerle visited the site for the 1st time. As was explained in the preparation room, during their visit they encountered flooding in the basement. John Pawson decided to maintain the water and dedicated a significant portion of the basement to it.

The lake has an interesting effect in the overall museum environment as the water surface emphasises the calmness that is experienced. But even here, nothing was left to chance as artificial ripples are created on the water surface to bring life to it. The ripples are extremely soft and almost unnoticeable. I will even say that it is almost unbelievable that they are not natural; if it were not for the tour guide answering my very specific question, I would have been convinced. The ripples create a subtle play of light as the water surface reflects and refracts the interior. Another great example of John Pawson’s fabulous work.

During the tour, there were some spaces that were not yet complete such as the Incense Room. I can only imagine the intensity one must be able to smell when we are void of light and vision. This experience alone is a good reason to return to the museum.

The Feuerle Collection Hallesches Ufer 70 10963 Berlin Germany http://thefeuerlecollection.org

Arch. John Pawson http://www.johnpawson.com/works/the-feuerle-collection/ http://www.johnpawson.com/works/stone-house/

The Dark Art www.thedarkart.org

Eye Adaptation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptation_(eye)

[philiprafael]

Dutch Embassy in Berlin by OMA architects

The Embassy of the Nederland’s in Berlin is a project designed to fit between the fine lines of public transparency and government confidentiality. Earlier this week I was lucky enough to do a tour of the building together with a group of architects. The tour-guide was very knowledgeable and not only did she answer all of the very particular questions made by the architects, but she also sparked an interesting debate amongst the group regarding the sincerity of architectural form versus the occupier’s need for privacy.

The project was designed by OMA architects and according to the tour, the project team was presented with a strict set of requirements imposed by the building authorities: the new build had to be attached to the neighbouring buildings, respect the heritage of the location, include a courtyard (typical for Berlin) and allocate 20% of the total area for residential living, etc.

In an act of creative defiance, OMA architects presented their Dutch clients with a proposal that included an independent building in the shape of a cube, this 1st volume would become the new Dutch Embassy; and a 2nd volume, fully detached from the 1st and separated by a courtyard. It was built along the neighbouring buildings, thus fulfilling the remaining requirements as it also housed the residential apartments. The 2 volumes are linked through a series of bridges.

According to the tour, the original brief was for the new embassy to symbolically represent transparency and be open to the public. This was without any doubt an unusual request for an embassy due to the sensitive nature of diplomatic confidentiality. To meet the brief, OMA architects designed within the embassy building a publicly open and serpentine-like pathway that would start at the 1stfloor entrance, spiral up through the various floors circulating around the entirety of the building and end on the top floor with the potential to continue to the roof (the stairs to the roof are closed to the public).

However, the construction of the project coincided with the tragic terrorist attacks of 9/11 in New York and since then, security policy was altered to not allow public access. After some deliberation, the Dutch embassy found an adequate balance between the original design intent and the new security policies that had been set in place; public visits are now possible but require online pre-approval.

To now get to the experience of the tour: there are a number of intricacies that make this project unique. The materials used: concrete, aluminium, wood, glass, etc. are all exposed and presented to the visitor in a raw form. I believe this to be a reinforcement of the concept of transparency. The concept is taken to such a level that even the suspended ceilings use perforated metal sheets because for this project brief, the inner working of the building’s mechanical services are equally worthy of the visitor’s eye. All the rooms have a window or view to the outdoors. There is only one exception, a meeting room that due to floor plan is landlocked. But even this landlocked space has more to tell as after further inspection, you can find a window in the floor opening downwards to the public foyer, a noble effort to achieve transparency considering the floor plan constraints.

The building also presents a complex interlacing of floors, where levels and half-levels fold over one another. The public pathway is part of this complexity as it unfolds in a sort of dance around the various spaces. The tour guide described how this creates a fascinating relationship with the users of the building as they end up creating their own personal mind map of it all, a mental plan that guides them through their workplace. This plan develops slowly over time growing with each new discovery.

And now, what I consider to be the true moment of discovery during my experience of the architecture: at a certain point in the pathway, the visitor gains sight of a diagonal void that is cutting through the 2ndvolume. The void is designed in such a way that it is perfectly framing the Berlin TV, a lovely moment of architectural detail that is harmoniously, and with precision, placing the building within its surroundings.

Due to security restrictions, photos of the interior are not allowed. 

Dutch Embassy online visit registration: http://duitsland.nlambassade.org/organization/de-ambassade/het-ambassadegebouw/visiting-arrangements-for-the-embassy-of-the-netherlands.html

OMA architects project page: http://oma.eu/projects/netherlands-embassy

[philiprafael]

Industrial Design in the GDR

This morning, before heading into the office, I decided to stop by the Kulturbrauerei in Berlin. I pass by it every day on the M10 but I don’t usually stop there; which is a pity because it’s quite an interesting place. The Kulturbrauerei is a centennial brewery in Berlin that was transformed into an important cultural centre for the city in 1991. It was renovated in 2000 by arch. Stefan Weiss and Matthias Faus. 

The Centre houses many institutions, businesses, cultural initiatives, etc., and amongst them is the “Everyday Life in the GDR” museum that is currently exhibiting an interesting temporary exhibition on GDR industrial design (product design for those in the US). This section of the museum has free entry.

The temporary exhibit is called “Alles nach Plan?” and roughly translates to Everything according to Plan. The name has an obvious interpretation of how a drawing plan should guide a production line but I suspect that it’s also hinting at a deeper political reality. The GDR was obsessed with the control of their population and the industrial designers of the era had to live and design in these circumstances; they were forced to become a tool of the GDR propaganda. 

The GDR and SED party considered foreign designs and products as symbols of Western decadence. In light of these views, a so-called “Formalism Campaign” was set in motion and it aimed at creating divisions between Eastern and Western design. To action the campaign, the "Amt für industrielle Formgestaltung" (Office for Industrial Design) was created.

 The office’s objectives were to promote an aesthetic style that was driven by political ideology, coherent social stability and the socialist planned economy. To a certain extent, these objectives were achieved as they created the designs that are now in exhibit at the museum, but it also backfired as it highlighted one of the most important drivers of the style. 

Design is a neutral and pragmatic discipline. Although there is no clear singular definition of design, it’s generally accepted that Form follows Function. Design sets itself out to find solutions to functional problems within certain boundaries and constraints.

One of the characterising features of DDR furniture design was the use of particleboard as an alternative to wood. The decision of DDR designers to use this material was not based on any particular quality that made it superior to wood; it was based on the short supply of wood in the GDR. In other words, design form did not follow function, it followed trade barriers.

In the aftermath of the reunification, there was a public rush to replace GDR products with products from the West. Why this rush? Surely they did not all suddenly become outdated? There are many factors that could have influenced it: it could have been an attempt to eradicate the old political and social structures, or simply the desire and ability to buy something new, who knows? What I ask is: is it possible that the collective conscious understood that the core principle of design had been tampered with?

Maybe I’m holding the design pedestal too high but in a world of divisions, is it possible that the collective conscious understands the underlying neutrality of design? And if that were true, would we not be able to use design as a tool to bring us together, a sort of safe place or topic where diversity can join to openly discuss, debate and design? I think so and discussing, no matter what the topic, is always the starting point of any solution. 

http://www.kulturbrauerei.de/ http://www.kulturbrauerei.de/gelaende/geschichte/

[philiprafael]

"Alles nach Plan?" GDR Industrial Design Collection

[philiprafael]

Iranian Lighting World

Last week, I had the pleasure of visiting Iran. My stay lasted about 4 days and caused quite an impression on me. Western media has had significant influence over our perception of the country so hopefully this blog will help give a different perspective.

I travelled to Iran’s capital, Tehran, to attend the Iranian Lighting Design Conference (ILDC). I recommend the conference and luckily, I was able to meet with a variety of different professionals from the industry.

As I went from meeting to meeting, I would look out the taxi window and pay attention to the people, the architecture and the differences between urban quarters. I noticed an unusual amount of large-scale projects spread throughout the city, but many of them were either at a slow pace of construction or completely paused. The impression this left on me was that the Iranian people had ambitious aspirations for their city but that the city also felt the weight of international sanctions.

My meetings with local industry colleagues proved to be very important as it again reminded me of the differences between business cultures. Lighting design in Iran has a very well defined method of how things work and understanding this is essential to any lighting designer that aspires to be successful.

In the West, lighting designers pride themselves as independent professionals with no direct links to the supply chain (manufacturing and distribution). That is not to say that this is the case for all lighting designers but most professional bodies make this a mandatory requirement and I abide by this philosophy as well. 

The crux of this issue is that a lighting designer has a professional duty to provide an unbiased service to their clients; in other words, to provide the best possible design that considers with the entirety of the market and not only a limited product range of a specific company. The reality of the Iranian market is different, what the local companies provide is something they describe as a “Full-Package”. This service includes design, engineering, supply and installation with the additional after-service option of maintenance.

There are a variety of reasons that lead the local industry in this direction. To begin with, the client prefers to not have to pay for the design service (although we all know that nothing is free, the design costs are simply hidden within the cost of purchase); 2nd, the Full-Package provides absolute control over what is offered ensuring that the design stays within the know-how of the installer; and 3rd, the solutions put forward are realistic as independent designers are not always aware of the supply difficulties that the project might suffer from due to trade barriers.

This reality was strongly emphasised by everyone. The architects I spoke to expressed liking the idea of working with an independent lighting designer but had a fair amount of doubt whether it would be viable in Iran.

I think the way forward for the lighting professionals of Iran must lay somewhere in the middle ground. There is no easy short-term answer as the core concept of independence is contradictory to the Full-Package deal provided by the local companies but it is important that designers work at bridging this gap!

www.ild-c.com

[philiprafael]

Christmas, Happiness and Architecture

For many, Christmas is a period of joy and happiness! It is a time when family and friends gather at the Christmas tree to offer and receive gifts, demonstrating gratitude and grace towards each other. This is obviously not the original religious intent of Christmas, but it is an important aspect of the tradition in its current form.

What I would like to focus on today is happiness, more precisely on how our inner happiness can be influenced by the exterior built environment. The French writer Stendhal wrote, “there are as many styles of beauty as there are visions of happiness”. He later also wrote that “beauty was the promise of happiness”. These quotes are relevant because they link the concept of beauty with happiness, placing them as two sides to the same coin.

Whilst it is impossible for one to list all the forms of happiness (and beauty), it might be possible to decipher the core mechanics of the emotion, as it is more likely than not, significantly simpler to understand.

It is in our nature to project human emotions and qualities to the objects that surround us. When we find ourselves imagining faces of loved ones in the clouds, we are simply placing a human personality in a nonliving object. This is also true with architecture, although more subtly, this subconscious exercise also takes place with the architectural form or its underlying symbolism. The building or designed space becomes equally capable of affecting us in the same manner that the projected emotion would have if it had been caused by the person in real life.

The English writer John Ruskin claimed that what we sought in architecture was for “buildings to speak to us – to speak to us of whatever we find important and needed to be reminded of.” If this is true, then what are the messages that make us feel happy?

We can approach this topic from a different perspective by looking at the work of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. The two psychoanalysts tell us that, on a conscious level, the qualities that we like or appreciate most in others are those that we subconsciously feel have the ability to complete us. They complete us because deep inside our subconscious, we feel we lack them.

In the book The Architecture of Happiness, Alain de Button writes that “we are drawn to call something beautiful whenever we detect that it contains in a concentrated form the qualities in which we personally, or our societies more generally, are deficient.” This point is very similar with Jung and Freud in the sense that we seek in architecture/others a medium or a catalyst to evoke something within ourselves.

To conclude, what we find beautiful in others and the built environment are the qualities that make us feel complete and when we surround ourselves with beauty, we feel happy. Is this the aim of architecture, to evoke or encourage in us certain moods or qualities? Are these the messages that Ruskin wanted architecture to speak to us about? Did he suggest that beautiful architecture is the one that speaks to us of visions of happiness? Possibly. In the end, when we build, we do not only build a structure, we erect from the ground an architecture that can be better version of ourselves.

[philiprafael]

James Turrell  |  Dorotheenstäd Chapel

James Turrell has long been a key inspiration for lighting designers. His light and colour sensory experiences are well known and have opened a Pandora’s box for the lighting community. It has led lighting designers to question the role of light and colour in our perception of space and void.

Today, I visited the permanent installation in the chapel of the Dorotheenstäd cemetery in Berlin. A good friend of mine had mentioned it to me and this morning, out of pure randomness, I decided to go. However, I advise not to go out of randomness. The chapel has specific opening times and tours and these vary from day to day and season to season. The times are available online so it’s better that you check before heading over.

For those that know me, deciding to do something out of randomness isn’t unheard of and of course, as you would expect, the chapel wasn’t scheduled to be open when I arrived. But luckily for me, a kind person who manages the chapel happened to be there and she open heartedly let me in to experience the chapel and installation in privacy and without interruption.

So even before entering, my luck at the door had started to set a certain mood of providence and exclusivity. When the door shut behind me, the chapel became very dreamlike and peacefully silent. The lighting was turned on and suddenly Turrell’s colours started to fill the space.

Lighting is as much of the architecture as the bricks, stone and wood that built the chapel. The void too gains importance as through the coloured light, it’s given a voice that allows it to express itself. Lighting designers have long known that the lit environment can help define the mood and atmosphere but Turrell’s use of pastel and saturated colours communicates this in an impactful yet elegant way.

At the time of my visit, it wasn’t a particularly cold December day in Berlin but the chapel was a bit chilly inside. Whether this was intentional or not, the cooler temperature played its part in the experience as it created in me a certain level of alertness to my surroundings and myself.

Through daylight, the inside of the chapel is deeply connected to the exterior. I would have expected that such a lighting experience would require a controlled environment but the use of frosted glazing allows daylight to enter and merge with the coloured lighting in the softest of ways.

Together, daylight and the coloured lighting become two sides of one project. Daylight bestows itself with an omnipresent and shadowless effort while the artificial coloured lighting gives the chapel a humanistic connection to desire, mood and disposition.

For those that live or visit Berlin, I highly recommend this experience. Allow yourself time to sit and contemplate the architecture and lighting. You’ll be surprised at how mind opening it can be.

Chapel http://www.evfbs.de/index.php?id=144

Opening Times http://www.evfbs.de/index.php?id=602

Architect http://www.nedelykov-moreira.com/en/projekte/kirchen-grabstaetten/dorotheenstaedtischer-friedhof

Lighting Installation http://jamesturrell.com/

[philiprafael]

Place, Space and Design Book Club Berlin | In Praise of Shadows

There’s an interesting book club in Berlin that focuses on art, design and architecture. The book club is fairly recent and the members are from various different backgrounds: architects, various designers, illustrators, art history and some who do not seem to have a connection to the design nor art world but have a native sensitivity to the philosophy of aesthetics.

Last week, we looked at a book that is dear to me, In Praise of Shadows by Junishirō Tanizaki. For those that follow my work with The Dark Art, you’re probably aware how this particular essay has influenced my views on this topic.

In Praise of Shadows has been a reference for The Dark Art. Many of the important issues from the darkness debate revolve around concepts that are close interpretations of this book: the concept of aesthetics and beauty being born from shadow and mystery; the importance of balance in ones life and how the inner self extends to the built environment, where shadow is a fundamental counter balance to light; and finally the concept of refuge and safety that we feel when comforted by shadow and how these feelings are the perfect ingredients for deep thought and inner creativity.

To my surprise, the book club did not feel this to be a great book. The club compared Junishiro’s essay to ramblings of an old man that strayed from one topic to another. This is not to say that they did not find the book interesting but simply that for each new topic or shadow reference, there was a 50% hit and miss chance it being inspirational.

To a certain extent, the book club is right and to another extent, they are not. Within Junichiro's ramblings are visionary elements of design and aesthetics that go beyond anything else that was written at the time. In Praise of shadows is an ode to mindfulness where beauty becomes a core element of life and an appreciation of beauty is found hidden within the understated nuances of shadow.

So, to help cherry pick the ramblings, here are my favourite quotes:

Life “The quality that we call beauty, however, must always grow from the realities of life…”

Mindfulness. “…we Orientals tend to seek our satisfactions in whatever surroundings we happened to find ourselves, to content ourselves with things as they are… If light is scarce then light is scarce; we will immerse ourselves in the darkness and there discover its own particular beauty.”

Consumerism and Excess “The progressive Westerner is determined always to better his lot. From candle to oil lamp, oil lamp to gaslight, gaslight to electric light – his quest for a brighter light never ceases, he spares no pains to eradicate even the minutest shadow.”

Sustainability “A room should be brighter in Winter, but dimmer in Summer… But people will light the lights, then switch on an electric fan to combat the heat. The very thought annoys me.”

Place, Space and Design Book Club Berlin https://www.meetup.com/Place-Space-and-Design-Bookclub-Berlin/

In Praise of Shadows http://dcrit.sva.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/In-Praise-of-Shadows-Junichiro-Tanizaki.pdf

The Dark Art www.thedarkart.org

[philiprafael]

Philip Rafael on Twitter

“Rereading In Praise of Shadows. Highly recommend it #darkness #lightingdesign #thedarkart”

Rereading In Praise of Shadows. It’s has been a great source of inspiration for me. Highly recommend it!

[philiprafael]

Philip Rafael on Twitter

“Great time in Prague!!! @IALDEurope & #Enlighten Europe was an inspiring experience!! But as with all travels now it's time to head home...”

Great time in Prague!!! IALD Enlighten Europe was an inspiring experience!! But as with all travels now it's time to head home...