Concept Development

Following from a conversation I had with Ben last week – I began looking into different routes for potential project outcomes. In particular, I began focusing on the concept of using the ‘joyful’ archive I had begun gathering to create a space for people.

I began playing with the concept of creating a space that would project these captured moments of joy inside – similar to a planetarium. These moments of joy could be captured and displayed as a video clip, an image or simply text alone. Another prospect to this concept would be that it would allow me to engage with more of the audiences senses, rather than them just experiencing something purely visual – a space opens up the potential to engage in peoples sense of hearing and smell too. Imagine walking into a space that smelt like freshly baked bread?

Light Maze

I began looking into spaces that had been made previously to engage with urban environments or just members of the public in general to create a positive emotional reaction. I remembered coming across some form of iridescent maze in Leeds Train Station back in 2018 – unfortunately there was no information to be seen, just this beautiful maze display for members of the public to use. I remember the maze brought an overwhelming sense of childlike curiosity which seduced me into interacting with the design – this feeling of play is something I would definitely like to embed within my joy project.

I wanted to find out who had designed the maze to see what their process was – I wanted to find out why they carried out this project, was it to bring joy? If so, what research had they put in place before the instalment? Did they manage to gather data to see if it had worked? Thus, began a phone call journey, talking to nearly anyone that could of possibly had something to do with the organisation of this display. To give you an idea on call time, here’s a short map to who I’ve spoken with whilst on my search.

Visit Leeds > Network Rail > Space & People > Trinity Leeds > Yorkshire Post

Unfortunately these phone calls didn’t get me anywhere, and there was nothing to be found on Google either. At one last ditch attempt I just typed in ‘iridescent maze’ and scrolled through google images until I finally found it!

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https://www.leedsinspired.co.uk/events/heofon-light-maze

I found out that it had been put in place by Ben Busche from Brut Deluxe, and manufactured by Ilmex S.A in collaboration with ARRO Lighting. However there still wasn’t much information on why it was there. Although I couldn’t find this exact instalment on Brut Deluxe’s website, they did have the same type of exhibition on there that they had been commissioned to do in China. Here they provided pretty precise information on how they had created and installed the project, but there wasn’t really information on why.

So I reached out to them, briefly explaining my reasoning for wanting to know further information.