Programmed Light: Medium and Movement
Proposal conceived by Stanley Casselman
“Programmed Light” explores the properties and possibilities of an extraordinary medium—as a
subject, technology, methodology, and evolving movement for diverse practices of contemporary
art. Defined as the use of light that is programmed by a computer or other remote source,
“programmed light” takes many forms and has varied implications for artists working today. This
project, “Programmed Light,” will highlight the centrality of this medium for many established and
emerging artists working in the Americas and internationally. It seeks to create a foundational
historical discourse for a subject of sustained and growing importance, one which is at the cuttingedge intersection between art and science today and yet understudied. Conceived to be a largescale exhibition, “Programmed Light” intends to bring together an open selection of artists who
have engaged “programmed light” as a medium or method and have contributed to its innovations
already; it simultaneously presents significant quality work that formally or conceptually fits into
conventional contemporary and art historical discourses. By no means exhaustive, and with no
intent to assume false relationships or resolved causalities among artists working with
“programmed light,” this project is a first opportunity to understand the nuanced connections
among artists who have made meaningful and advanced the possibilities for a particular form of
light art in the past generation.
Background
For only over a century, electrical light has revolutionized almost every aspect of modern life; and,
for almost as long, innovations in light technology have inspired artists across the world to engage
and respond to the realities of their day. While many major art historical movements including
Futurism and Op Art indirectly supported and engaged foundational concepts and principles of
light, there have also been significant artists and movements involved directly in furthering our
understanding of light. Laszlo Moholy Nagy—the Bauhaus Professor who strongly advocated an
integration of art, technology, and industry (Fig. 1), Thomas Wilfred—who developed “Lumia”
compositions of light, color, and form (Fig. 2), and Zdenek Pesanek—who created the first kinetic
light sculpture (Fig. 3), can be considered among the earliest pioneers of light art in the early-mid
twentieth century.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
Light Space Modulator, 1922-‘30
Metal, motors, yellow, green, blue and red electric light bulbs
47” x 47” x 39” (120 x 120 x 100cm)
Figure 3
Thomas Wilfred
Early Clavilux Jr, 1930
Metal, wood, electric light, hand colored glass disks
Projected image dimensions: 22” x 17.3” (56 x 44cm)
Zdenek Pesanek
Torso of Man and Woman, 1930
Glass, metal, neon
30” x 17” x 13” (76 x 43 x 33cm)
Through the mid-to-late-twentieth century, leading artists dedicated their practices to the
presentation of light through various modes of “light art,” including pioneer Dan Flavin, whose
Minimalist sculptures were constructed from white and colored electric tube lights (Fig. 4), and
Waltraut Cooper, who twice represented Austria in the Venice Biennale with her light art
sculptures (Fig. 5).
Figure 4
Figure 4
Figure 5
Waltraut Cooper
The art of a mathematician, 1986
Installation view at the Venice Biennale, 1986
Dimensions variable
Dan Flavin
“monument” 1 for V. Tatlin, 1964
Cool white fluorescent light
96” high (244cm)
Dia Art Foundation
Photo Billy Jim
With the advent and democratization of computer technologies in the past generation, artists have
increasingly turned to “programmed light” to orchestrate and communicate with artificial light.
This exhibition endeavors to be the first large-scale interpretive project to differentiate
“programmed light” from a broader canon of light art, endeavoring to locate and understand its
particularities and workings as a still-developing medium. Though there is considerable slippage
and overlap among the sections outlined below, the headings suggested begin to illustrate some of
the varied ways in which contemporary artists have engaged “programmed light,” and (without
prescription) may be used as guideposts or organizational structures for research and presentation
of this project.
Pioneering “Programmed Light”
Renowned American artist James Turrell (b. 1943) has remarked that light is the content of his
work, and that perception is his object. In his works, Turrell projects and channels light into a total
three-dimensional experience for his viewer, and he continues to pursue a career-long goal to use
light to delve beneath the surface materialism of art. This manifests in his geometric light
installations, which are felt as color-intense voids that often encompass an entire room, and in his
magnum opus-in progress, which is the transformation of Roden Crater (an extinct volcano in
Arizona) into a perceptual and celestial work of art. Turrell began his career in Southern California
in the 1960s as part of the “Light and Space Artists Group,” and through the Los Angeles County
Museum of Art, he and other artists had the opportunity to work with preeminent scientists to
develop their ideas with the latest technology. In particular, his works have demonstrated the
need to look beyond the painting color wheel to the broader possibilities of the light spectrum, and
to think in terms of “additive” color (which means light directly emitted from a source or
illuminant), rather than the “subtractive” (the absorption of some wavelengths) with which we see
colors that have been combined from pigments. Consideration of works from throughout Turrell’s
career offers an historical context and conceptual framework for subsequent innovations in
“programmed light;” more specifically, his “Tall Glass” series (e.g. Fig. 6) comprises an important
innovation in the medium by introducing a temporal dimension into Turrell’s practice. Those
pieces, comprised of a series of individually programmed LEDs or a series of neon tubes, present
continuous fields of light that subtly change color, mirroring the process and experience of the sky
moving from day into night.
Figure 6
James Turrell
Silent Leading, 2006 (3 views)
LED Light, programming, etched glass, shallow space
7’2” x 4’ (218.4 x 122cm)
Photos: Florian Holzerr
New Modes of Perception
In some cases building directly on Turrell’s innovations, several notable contemporary artists use
“programmed light” to create distinct perceptual experiences. The American artist Leo Villareal (b.
1967) conceptualizes and designs his light sculptures first on a computer, in a manner akin to an
architectural process; this has resulted in massive installations like Multiverse (2005-8, Fig. 7) for
the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. For that work, the artist programmed ca. 41,000 LED
lights into a tunnel through which viewers walked and were enveloped by abstract and ever
changing configurations of light. Unusually and critically, through the embrace of random light
interactions inherent from his programming approach, Villareal curates his controlled sequences
from a seemingly infinite number of patterns and configurations to arrive at what is finally
displayed for the audience.
Figure 7
Leo Villareal
Multiverse, 2009
Concourse walkway between the East and West buildings of the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.
Approximately 41,000 LED’s, programming
200’ in length (6096cm)
French artist Pierre Huyghe (b. 1962) also develops massive and intense moving light
installations, including the three-part installation Scintillating Expedition (2002, Fig. 8); the work
is concert-like and almost cinematic, a system unto itself that needs to be perceived from the
outside.
Figure 8
Pierre Huyghe
L’Expedition Scintillante, Act 2, Untitled, 2002 (2 views)
Light-box, computer controlled lights, fog, sound
6’6” x 6’3” x 5’1” (200 x 190 x 155cm)
Perhaps most famously, Olafur Eliasson (b. 1967) engages “programmed light” to present dynamic
phenomenological experiences, like 360º room for all colours (2002, Fig. 9), in which the audience
is surrounded by a seemingly-infinite and ever-changing room of color (created by programmed
light).
Figure 9
Olafur Eliasson
360 degree room for all colours, 2002 (5 views)
Stanless steel, fluorescent tubes, projection foil, wood, control unit
Installation views, top: Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris 2002. Others: San Francisco Museum of Modern
Art, 2007
26’8” x 26’8” x 10’6” (815.3 x 815.3 x 320cm)
Eliasson’s recent projects like Your atmospheric color atlas (2009, Fig. 10) continue to explore
critical elements of sensation and temporality, filtering audience experiences of space through an
atmosphere created by colored light.
Figure 10
Olafur Eliasson
Your atmospheric color atlas, 2009 (4 views)
Red, green and blue fluorescent tubes, fog, programming
Installation views: 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, 2009-‘10
Dimensions variable
Photos: ART IT
News Media, Text, and “Programmed Light”
Pioneer of video art and participant in Fluxus, Nam June Paik (b. 1932 – d. 2006) began to
incorporate live televisions into his art as early as 1963, and over a long and celebrated career,
made the electronic moving image an important form for contemporary art. Continuously building
on his own innovations, and adapting the trope of the television, Paik developed large-scale
installations with computer-programmed images projected onto monitors, including
Megatron/Matrix (1995, Fig. 11). Later, he innovated with what he termed “post-video projects”
into his oeuvre at the end of his career, projecting laser technology onto scrims, cascading
waterfalls, and smoke-filled sculptures.
Figure 11
Nam June Paik
Megatron Matrix, 1995 (6 views)
Eight channel computer driven video installation with 215 monitors, color, sound
Megatron: 126” x 270” x 24” (320 x 686 x 61cm), Matrix: 128 x 128 x 24” (325 x 325 x 61cm)
In her work, leading American artist Jenny Holzer (b. 1950) considers personal and political
realities, references tropes and paradigms from advertising and news media, and engages
mediums including text, installation, and light-based works. Through “programmed light,” Holzer
is able to weave a temporal dimension and motion into her practice, controlling the viewer’s
reception of her messages in a way that would be impossible with conventional modes of public
display, and even with static light. Holzer’s nimble use of “programmed light” has been most
prominent in her use of LED lights to give an image to her seminal “truisms”. Monument (2008,
Fig. 12) shows horizontally rotating “truisms” (1977-79), and “inflammatory essays” (1979-82)
using LED signs as the moving surface of a circular tower. Recently, Holzer has also conceived a
Figure 12
Jenny Holzer
MONUMENT, 2008
22 double-sided, semi-circular electronic LED signs: 13 with red and white
diodes; 9 with red and blue diodes on front and blue and white diodes on back
194.3” x 58.8” x 28.9” (493.5 x 146.8” x 73.4cm)
Text: Truisms, 1977-’79; Inflamitory Essays, 1979-‘82
Photo: Vassilij Gureev
series of “Projections,” which have been described as akin to credits rolling at the end of a film,
with site specific installations at Mass MoCA (Fig. 13) and other places complementing Monument
and other works.
Figure 13
Jenny Holzer
Projections, 2008
Installation view at Mass MoCA
Building 5, projectors at both ends
Text by Wislawa Szymborska
Dimensions variable
Media artist Ben Rubin likewise engages “programmed light” as a communicative tool to bridge
architecture, art, and design, developing his work through his own EARStudio in New York. For the
show “Sign Language” (2003), Rubin presented texts extracted from topical online news sources
with “programmed light,” so that computer technology was integral to both the presentation and
politics of the work; specifically, for the piece (in)stability (2004, Fig. 14), the artist filtered 1,000
news sources reported within five days of the US invasion of Iraq into an installation, and
determined that the most commonly cited quote was “The situation is stable.”
Abstracting “Programmed Light”
Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama (b. 1929) integrates “programmed light” into a practice spanning
many mediums. Throughout her career, Kusama has worked with the form of abstract polka dots,
which she calls “infinity nets” and claims emerge from a long history of hallucinations. In painting,
sculpture, fashion, and light installations, Kusama has repeated and replicated her infinity nets. In
2000, she created Fireflies on the Water (Fig. 15), a room with hundreds of colored lights
twinkling and reflecting over a dark pool of water; a plank in the room enabled the viewer to
participate in the installation, and intimated the distinct experience of standing in an abyss that
could be several inches or hundreds of feet deep.
Figure 14
Figure 15
Yayoi Kusama
Fireflies on the Water, 2000
LED’s, water, mirror, programming
Dimensions variable
Ben Rubin
(in)stability, 2004
LED tubes, controller
40” x 30” x 2.5” (101.5 x 76 x 6cm)
Like Kusama, Anselm Reyle (b. 1970) engages multiple mediums, exploring the legacy of
abstraction and modernist history of formalism in his work. For Monochrome Age (2009, Fig. 16),
Reyle transformed design objects found at the East German Robotron computer company into
geometric modules framed by shifting, colored LED lights, and he continues to interpret
abstraction into multiple mediums.
Figure 16
Anselm Reyle
Relief, 2009
Plastic, rust, optics, LED’s
120.5” x 217” x 3” (306 x 551 x 15cm)
Painting “Programmed Light”
Coinciding with notions of abstraction described above, Stanley Casselman (b. 1963) directly
integrates the possibilities of programmed light into a painting practice. As many of his works
include both programmed light and actual painting; he furthermore defines himself as a painter
who’s obsessed with light. Casselman’s particular engagement with this these dual mediums in
works including Evolution-One-Emma (2008-10, Fig. 17) create a visually elusive dialog on what is
perceived as the luminescence of light vs. light revealing or illuminating an object. The effect and
importance of light in his practice is further emphasized by the fact that he creates, programs, and
presents his work in a completely dark environment.
Figure 17
Stanley Casselman
Evolution-One-Emma, 2008-‘10
Acrylic on polyscreen, light-box, LED’s, programming (cycle time, 24:02)
99” x 89.25” x 5.5” (251.5 x 226.7 x 14cm)
“Programmed Light” and Architecture
Austrian-born Erwin Redl (b. 1963) transforms architectural spaces with programmed light
installations. Redl’s Matrix VI (Fig. 18) was the literal face of the 2002 Whitney Biennial, as he
designed a curtain of colored LED lights to illuminate the front of the Breuer building at night. His
projects, which often use light sensors to respond to specific conditions like brightness and
weather, have animated many other buildings internationally, offering viewers unusual opportunity
to experience and comprehend the volume of particular buildings and spaces.
Figure 18
Erwin Redl
Matrix VI, 2002
LED installation
84’ x 52’ x 20’ (2,560 x 1,585 x 610cm)
Whitney Biennial 2002, Whitney Museum New York City
Erwin Redl
Morph, 2007
LED installation
8’11” x 10’6” x 28’10” (272 x 320 x 879cm)
Canadian-born, London- and Berlin-based Angela Bulloch (b. 1966) creates large-scale
architectural installations that include programmed “pixel boxes” of light (Fig. 19), which house
their own industrially-produced electronic control unit. Her work is insistently interactive,
incorporating the viewer’s presence into her interest in the architectural (man-made) and human
(organic) systems operating in the world around us; in particular, the pixel boxes work to break
down the parts and order of cinema.
Figure 19
Angela Bulloch
Macro World; One Hour cubed and Canned, 2002
Light-boxes, LED’s, controllers
Installation view at Esther Schipper Gallery, Berlin
Dimensions variable
Waltraut Cooper, too, has turned to programmed light as a medium of her work; in 2006, she
developed a Lictquadrat (Light Square) of programmed LED’s for the side of the Ritter Museum in
Germany (Fig. 20). The square installation, with an alternating color pattern logically
programmed, responded to the theme of the museum, which is connected to the aesthetic of the
Ritter Sport chocolate company, as also to the form of the building.
Figure 20
Waltraut Cooper
Square Light, 2006 (3 views)
Metal, acrylic, LED’s
30’6” x 30’6” x 3” (1200 x 1200 x 8cm)
Ritter Museum, Stuttgart Germany
“Programmed Light” Around Us
Artists and others use programmed light to transform and transfix the broader world around us.
Jim Campbell (b. 1956) has worked with LED lights for over a decade to discern and give an image
to our visual and natural environments, as in his 2010 solo show “Exploded View” (Fig. 21). His
works from that exhibition suggest an elision between two- and three-dimensional perception, so
that videos like Seal Rock (2010, Fig. 22) create a constantly-shifting landscape that exaggerates
real changes in the natural world.
Figure 21
Jim Campbell
Exploded View, 2010
1152 LED’s, custom electronics
48” x 72” x 36” (122 x 183 x 91.5cm)
Edition of 3
Figure 22
Jim Campbell
Seal Rock, 2010
1720 LED’s, custom electronics, duratrans, treated plexiglass
33” x 44” x 3” (84 x 112 x 7.5cm)
Edition of 3
Takuro Osaka (b. 1948), considered the pioneer of light art in Japan, uses programmed light to
simulate forces in the natural environment. In Perpendicular (2002, Fig. 23), from the series
“Revelation by Cosmic Rays,” Takuro uses LED lights to create a room-size situation in which
viewers face lines of light that arrive and disappear as pure energy, conveying the impermanence
of natural phenomena and our existence.
Figure 23
Takuro Osaka
Perpendicular, 2002 (3 views)
256 red LED’s, programming
8’6” x 34’ (264 x 1,036cm)
Quite spectacularly, Chinese artist Cai Guo Qiang (b. 1957) reintroduces the medium of
programmed light into a real environment, using it along with other materials—like gunpowder,
arrows, and clay—to create often-magical visual and physical explosions in public spaces, even
organizing fireworks displays to open and close the 2008 Beijing Olympics (Fig. 24).
Figure 24
Cai Guo-Qiang
Five Olympic Rings; fireworks projected for the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing
Realized August 8 and 24, 2008
Dimensions variable
Lower image:
Closing Rainbow; fireworks projected for the closing ceremony of the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing
Realized August 24, 2008
Dimensions variable
And in our real experience and collective memory, Tribute In Light, the light displays that shoot up
from the World Trade Center in New York to commemorate the September 11 attacks offer an
important example of the visual potency and conceptual relevance of programmed light in our
contemporary culture.
Organization
This proposal is presented by New York-based artist Stanley Casselman, a practitioner of
“Programmed Light” art. Casselman’s extensive study of light-based art forms and experience with
the intersections of painting and technological art practices led to an inquiry into the broader
practices and possibilities of “programmed light.” The proposal is at once an homage to the
historic pioneers of this practice, and call for expansion into our consideration of its importance
and of the artists most directly engaged with it today. Though Casselman offers this topic and his
research on the subject to the Institution, his professional involvement in the project will be
adaptable to the prevailing organizational structure and professional roles already existing, so long
as his research, intellectual property, and art are properly credited. In undertaking research for
this proposal, Casselman has developed a list of curators, writers, and institutions with experience
on this topic, whose interest and expertise may aid in the successful implementation of this
project.
Recommended resources for “Programmed Light” and Light Art
Biennale for Light Art, Ruhr, 2010 (the first Biennale dedicated to light art):
http://www.biennale-lichtkunst.de/pages/en/home/index.welcome.htm
Light Art from Artificial Light, ZKM, Karlsruhe, 2006
See: http://hosting.zkm.de/lightart/stories/storyReader$7
Light Art Name Cloud:
http://www.orbit.zkm.de/?q=orbitnavigation/tag/322
Relevant studies of the topic:
Barzel, Ammon. LightArt. (Milan: Skira, 2005).
Center for International Light Art Unna. (Koln: Wienand, 2004).
Details the plan and program for new center for international light art (one of first artists included
was James Turrell)
Curators/Scholars/Writers on “Programmed Light” Artists
Nicholas Bourriard
Lynn Herbert
Jeremy Miller
Elizabeth Smith
Matthias Wagner K
Peter Weibel