Milan, Italy – Over sixty Clay Paky Mythos fixtures are currently lighting the famous Tree of Life sculpture for the Milan Expo 2015, in a stunning light show conceived by renowned lighting designer Koert Vermeulen of ACT Lighting Design.
Koert Vermeulen worked alongside creative director Marco Balich of Balich Worldwide Shows and architect Florian Boje from Gio Forma Architect for the project, specifying the award-winning Clay Paky fixtures from rental house Agorà. Located on the Expo site in front of the Italian Pavilion, The Tree of Life serves as a centrepiece and meeting place throughout the 6-month event, with the light show repeated twice daily to entertain visitors.
“The ‘Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life’ theme of the Expo is reflected in the light show,” explains Vermeulen. “It evokes the relationship between man and nature and the Mythos play a particularly predominant role. This is where their strong beam functions, incredible speed and purity of the open white they produce come into play. Their colour mixing is also fantastic, allowing me to achieve a wonderfully vibrant red which I used for accent colour.”
Vermeulen positioned the Mythos in three areas: around the Lake Arena, in which the Tree of Life is reflected, at the base of the architectural structure and at the top where they produce an impressive aerial display.
The fixtures are housed inside Clay Paky IGLOOS, tough sturdy enclosures moulded from UV-resistant transparent polycarbonate. These are carefully designed to ensure flawless projection without loss of light or image distortion and offer complete protection against rain and humidity whilst maintaining a perfect working temperature for the units.
Thanks to their advanced construction, the IGLOOS work for both permanent and temporary installations. Their flexible mounting system allows orientation in any position without comprising their high IP rating, meaning they perfectly shelter the Mythos both on the ground and hung upside down from the Tree.
“As the Tree of Life plays such a significant part at the Expo, we knew we needed powerful fixtures that would produce fantastic effects,” explains Vermeulen. “We were originally going to use the SuperSharpy but changed to the Mythos on recommendation from Clay Paky. We were excited by the idea of a hybrid fixture with an impressive zoom and as I have over 20 years experience dealing with Clay Paky I was confident it’d be the right tool to achieve the looks I wanted.”
The Milan Expo 2015 runs from 1 May until the 31 October. This is the second time Milan has hosted the exposition, the first being the Milan International of 1906.
“TREE OF LIFE” – EXPO 2015
Concept: Marco Balich
Design: Marco Balich & Studio Gioforma
Lighting Design & Direction of Mise-en-Scene : Koert Vermeulen & ACT lighting design
Technology set-up: RTI Agorà, Bridge Over Troubled Water (Botw) and Ternana Impianti
Made possible by: Orgoglio Brescia, Coldiretti and Pirelli