In this issue:

This is a special issue. In the first place, it is special for me because it rounds off my first year as editor-in-chief of LUCE with a balance sheet full of wonderful human and professional experiences. And, then, because it is an issue rich in content and novelties that have gradually built up and developed over the course of the year with meetings, discussions and reflections.  It starts with a graphic restyling of the inside pages by art director Lorenzo Mazzali and an “author’s cover” designed especially for LUCE by Ico Migliore, the famous architect and designer who has already received two Compasso d’Oro awards.  Drawing plays an important part in our visual communication and is also featured in the magazine with the new addition of a comic strip page conceived and created by two young cartoonists, Alberto Philippson and Deborah Madolini …

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LUCE meets Nino Migliori who tells us about his experience as a photographer, as well as his never-ending curiosity and constant urge to experiment, explaining how light influences his art and dominates our lives. “I have always wanted to look for new languages, making no difference between technologies, between film and digital. And I also use mobile phones. Everything passes through my point of view, which is never unbiased, representation is always unfaithful. I am an infidel. I called one of my works Unfaithful Landscapes…. I try to express myself using the camera and also the light, I have to, because otherwise I could not do it. Mine is an attempt to enhance the pleasure of light over darkness. Darkness that means not being able to see and hear….”

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A dialogue on design, this is how we can describe the multi-voice interview that took place for LUCE in the Atelier Migliore+Servetto, the design studio in Milan that retraces the steps of a Renaissance “workshop” that is already part of the future. We talk with the founders Ico Migliore and Mara Servetto, this year’s ambassadors in Korea and France at Italian Design Day 2023, about their most recent projects, including the headquarters of The Human Safety Net (THSN) in the Procuratie Vecchie in Piazza San Marco in Venice and in Milan the MIND common ground areas and the ADI Museum, and others in the making. In their work, light always plays a guiding role, which is best expressed in the creation of a dramaturgy that contributes to creating engaging environments, with a strong identity and characterised by a constant dialogue of artificial light with natural light…

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LUCE meets lighting designer Pascal Mérat who talks about his experience and about the relationship between light and music in the theatre that has always characterised his projects up to his latest work, Giuseppe Verdi’s Don Carlos, which opened the opera season at La Scala in Milan on 7 December. “I followed the orchestral colours very carefully. You understand from the music what intensity the light should have, but without getting caught up in the emotion of the music itself…. Light has a lot to do with the beat of time. The time used to make the different light sources appear or disappear, the precise moment at which images form and dissolve on the scene. Voilà: this is the dynamism of light. In an opera, light goes in time with the music…”

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Starting from this issue, the “Light on the young people” column will feature a thesis abstract from among those sent to AIDI or the editorial staff, which have been deemed worthy of publication. We begin with that of Serena Loro, a student from the Politecnico di Torino, entitled “The influence of natural light in the real estate market: a case study in Turin,” which was awarded the “Mario Bonomo” prize during the award ceremony promoted by AIDI that took place in Milan on 1st December last…

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Since the end of last June, Elena Scaroni has been the new secretary general of the important organisation that now groups together 31 trade associations and companies in the lighting sector. In this interview, she tells the readers of LUCE about the goals of the European association’s Vision 2030, explaining the association’s strategies and goals up to 2030, which will bring interesting innovations for the lighting industry…

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The architect and lighting designer Alberto Pasetti Bombardella, author of the lighting project for the façade of the Cà d’Oro in Venice, highlights the interaction between the architectural morphology of the famous palace and the perceptual impression of its reflection in the lagoon, thanks to a “pictorial” project that reveals new emotional narratives. In this interview, we discover how it was possible and why the site-specific project will become a paradigm of a new “luministic-perceptual-spatial” approach that modifies the perception of what is seen through the light reflected in the water…

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An interview with architect and lighting designer Susanna Antico reveals and illustrates the lighting design of the “Railway Cathedral” in the brilliant Flemish city. This project is not only an excellent example of good lighting, but also of fruitful collaboration between the lighting designer and the public client of the Municipality of Antwerp. “We always work taking into consideration the space, the principles of perception and, of course, the project requirements. In this case, and in a very clear way, the client wrote in the call for tenders to create the most beautiful station in the world…”

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The phenomenon of vision represents a significant part of our perception as human beings. We often underestimate it, taking it for granted, but even a partial loss of vision is an extremely disabling event for those who have the misfortune to suffer it. These considerations may seem trivial, yet visual perception is not just a sophisticated mechanism for avoiding collisions or identifying people or objects. Seeing gives us the opportunity to get excited about a sunset or even to enjoy the beneficial effects of light on our organism. Our view of the world (i.e. the colours we see) is not an absolute, but the result of the interaction between energy, matter and the “hardware” that makes up our visual system. To make a long story short, it is our visual system made up of the eyes, optic nerves and brain that (thanks to the primary visual cortex) interprets the energy it receives, creating the colours as we know them…

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Car headlights have always been a key element in enabling the driver to see well while driving and, at the same time, make the car visible to other road users at night or in poor visibility conditions. The main goal remains the same: to ensure the highest level of safety, while also taking into account the visual impact the vehicle has on the road and implementing new light clusters with important communication functions.

LUCE met Roberto Barbieri, CEO of Osram Illuminazione, who told us about the latest state of the art and future scenarios of the role of lighting in the automotive sector, where the car will increasingly be conceived as the “third living space” and this will entail the search for high and sophisticated standards of comfort and customisation of the interior…

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In this issue’s special feature, we address the topic of the relationship between visual comfort and dynamic light, where we investigate the causes of resistance to the full adoption of the concept of human centric lighting and explore its challenges and opportunities. Light is closely tied to the human biorhythm and influences our mood, concentration and sleep quality. Accordingly, in interior spaces, dynamic lighting helps reproducing those characteristics of natural light needed to guarantee circadian rhythms and increase people’s sense of well-being by supporting them in the various moments of their everyday life…

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LUCE meets Domenico Pellegrino, a skilled sculptor of materials and colours. His works range from polychrome sculpture reinterpreting the exploits of the Superheroes, caught in those iconic poses that are now impressed in our Pop imagination, all the way to reaching out to take possession of the precious luminescent textures of the Italian “luminaria”. He recodes them in new shapes that swing between ancient and ritual symbolism of Sicilian religious festivals, and new inlays of polychrome light that dialogue with architecture and space through surprising site-specific installations. “Getting to light was a natural path. My studies, my path so strongly rooted in the study of Sicilian and Mediterranean traditions and the desire to rewrite new Mediterranean icons led me to draw with light. I rediscovered the light bulbs that adorn religious festivals and used them as a painter does with his brushes…”

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In 2001, the northern Arizona city of Flagstaff became the first in the world to obtain the International Dark Sky certification. It is an example of sustainability in the fight against light pollution where one of the most important observatories in the world is located and the Milky Way can be admired with the naked eye. LUCE met with Jeffrey Hall, astronomer and executive director of the Lowell Observatory who helped make Flagstaff the first International Dark City…

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In LUCE 346 | 2023 issue you can find many more articles, interviews and insights. We are always on the lookout for new tips and ideas to understand, explain and raise awareness of the Italian and international lighting world. Keep reading and writing to us.

 

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