Light Pollination

Light Pollination at the London Design Festival

Between 17 - 25 September, the London Design Festival will return to London to celebrate and promote London as the design capital of the world and as the gateway to the international creative community. As part of the 2016 edition of the festival, iGuzzini will be showcasing a piece of digital light art called 'Light Pollination', which will be stationed in the heart of the Brompton Design District, in South Kensington.

Light Pollination is an interactive digital artwork commissioned by iGuzzini to celebrate the power of light as a vehicle for social innovation and was designed by London-based digital-arts studio UniversalAssemblyUnit.

The installation seeks to spread the word about light, and in doing so, it explores the strong links between light and communication. Fibre optic, the primary material used to create the artwork, is a vehicle for light through which high-speed communication is facilitated. Thus, the art installation is both an expression and a prototype of this, albeit on a smaller scale. Rather than addressing a particular function, it imagines an alternative way of interacting with artificial light.

Powered by love of playful light, the artwork features around 20,000 individual points of LED light brought to the surface through fibre optics, and is dotted with interaction points. When light is shone onto these pollination points, the artwork immediately responds with growing bands of light, which expand progressively into wider and faster light bursts. This creates a pollinating effect across the artwork, completely transforming its landscape, in line with the Brompton Design District’s central theme of transformation.

Besides interacting with the artwork itself, visitors will also be able to interact with each other in a fun and engaging way, powered by playful flickering lights. This highlights the importance of the social aspect of bringing people together to pollinate the surface of the artwork and to communicate through light.

The exhibition is free to attend and will be open to the public throughout the duration of the festival.