Tag Archives: lighting

Embodiment: A Neon Skeleton by Eric Franklin

Embodiment: A Neon Skeleton by Eric Franklin neon lighting glass art anatomy

Portland-based sculptor Eric Franklin constructs stunning (if not slightly disconcerting) anatomical light structures that are fully hollow and filled with ionized krypton, causing them to glow similar to a neon light. The glass skeleton above, Embodiment, is my jaw-dropping favorite of this series. The piece took over 1,000 hours of work over a two year period and is actually built from 10 separate units of glass formed from borosilicate glass tubing. The process of creating something like this is unbelievably painstaking as Franklin shares via email:

Every glass seal has to be perfect, and this piece contains hundreds. Everywhere one tube joins another, or a tube terminates, glass tubes were sealed together. They have to be perfect in order to preserve the luminosity of the krypton. If one rogue molecule gets inside the void of the glass tubing it can eventually contaminate the gas and it will no longer glow. There are times when the holes in the seals are so small that you cannot actually see them with your eyes without the help of a leak detector. Once the glass pieces are ready to get filled with gas, I pull a high vacuum while the glass is hot in order to evacuate any dust or water vapor from the interior surface until there are literally no molecules inside the void of the glass. Then the krypton can be introduced and the glass sealed off. It’s an extremely tedious process, one I have somewhat of a love/hate relationship with.

You can see much more of Franklin’s work on his website, and if you liked this also check out the work of Jessica Lloyd-Jones. Photos above courtesy Brad Carlile. (via my amp goes to 11)

Anatomical Neon: Blown Glass Human Organs Containing Neon Lights by Jessica Lloyd-Jones

Anatomical Neon: Blown Glass Human Organs Containing Neon Lights by Jessica Lloyd Jones sculpture neon lighting glass anatomy

Anatomical Neon is a series of blown glass lights by North Wales-based artist Jessica Lloyd-Jones meant to focus attention on how energy is used by the human body. Describing the four pieces via her website she says:

Brain Wave conveys neurological processing activity as a kinetic and sensory, physical phenomena through its display of moving electric plasma. Optic Nerve shows a similar effect, more akin to the blood vessels of the eye and with a front ‘lens’ magnifying the movement and the intensity of light. Heart is a representation of the human heart illuminated by still red neon gas. Electric Lungs is a more technically intricate structure with xenon gas spreading through its passage ways, communicating our human unawareness of the trace gases we inhale in our breathable atmosphere.

The pieces were funded in part by awards from Arts Council Wales and Wales Arts International and executed at Urban Glass in New York in 2010. (via pinterest)

By Christopher on March 26, 2012 • anatomy glass lighting neon sculpture

Electric Man

Electric Man sculpture lighting art

My Light is Your Life is a figurative sculpture by Czech artist Krištof Kintera made from an assortment of old lamps, light fixtures, and cables. I also like his Lay Down and Shine piece. (via job’s wife)

By Christopher on February 5, 2012 • art lighting sculpture

A Cathedral Made from 55,000 LED Lights

A Cathedral Made from 55,000 LED Lights lighting installation art architecture

The Luminarie De Cagna is an imposing cathedral-like structure that was recently on display at the 2012 Light Festival in Ghent, Belgium. The festival was host to almost 30 exhibitions including plenty of 3D projection mapping, fields of luminous flowers, and a glowing phone booth aquarium, however with 55,000 LEDs and towering 28 meters high the Luminarie De Cagna seems to have stolen the show. ( via stijn coppens, sacha vanhecke, sector271)

By Christopher on January 31, 2012 • architecture art installation lighting

Loomi: A Modular Light Kit

Loomi: A Modular Light Kit lighting DIY design

Loomi is a modular, paintable, recyclable light shade made from high quality paper that’s cut into interlinking quadrilaterals. The set of 33 pieces can be formed into at least a dozen shapes and can be dyed, glued or otherwise modified to suit your creative whims. The Kickstarter project is going gangbusters and if you order asap they’ll ship before Christmas.

By Christopher on December 8, 2011 • design DIY lighting

Bruce Munro’s Newest Light Installation at the Holbourne Museum

Bruce Munros Newest Light Installation at the Holbourne Museum lighting installation Bath art

Artist Bruce Munro has unveiled his latest light installation at Holbourne Museum in Bath. The field of more than 5,000 Christmas lights atop acrylic stems sprawls across the museum grounds intending to mimic the way a barren desert bursts into bloom after a brief rainfall. See much more over at the Daily Mail. (via notcot)

By Christopher on November 25, 2011 • art Bath installation lighting

Incredible Interactive Light Sculpture by Joshua Kirsch

Incredible Interactive Light Sculpture by Joshua Kirsch sculpture lighting art

New Jersey artist Joshua Kirsch has just completed work on his latest interactive sculpture, Concentricity 96 which was on display at the Grand Rapids Art Prize earlier this month. The wildly futuristic device presents the viewer with a glowing white handle that can be moved in any direction resulting in a fantastic, close-quarters light show. Reed switches embedded in the sculpture’s circuitry sense the magnetized handle and translate its movement into a massive array of 96 red/white LED lights. Over the past four years Kirsch estimates he’s spent nearly 800 hours on the piece, machining almost all of the aluminum and steel components by hand.

Kirsch has previously created other interactive artworks including Sympathetic Resonance, a musical device using marimba components that has been shown in various configurations since 2009, a beautiful donor wheel for the Arts Council at Princeton University, and early explorations of the concentricity series such as Oculus. Via phone he says much of his work stems from a desire when entering an art museum to touch and interact with the exhibitions which is generally not possible. In that light, ahem, his artwork exists in stark contrast to the “no touching” rule in that it can only be experienced fully with direct physical manipulation. Concentricity 96 is not currently on display, so if some curator would like to bring it to Chicago so I can play with for a few hours, beers are on me. Seriously.

By Christopher on October 26, 2011 • art lighting sculpture

Star in a Jar

Spotted this clever electric lightbulb in a jar by artist Matt Johnson whose current exhibition at Blum and Poe in Los Angeles runs through October 22.