In support of the various initiatives aimed at promoting the candidature of the City of Trieste for Expo 2008, a luminous projection in very large characters on the City Hall, in Piazza dell’Unità, could certainly not have been unobserved.
For 90 days this “panel of light” was part of the daily life not only of the people of Trieste but also of the 400,000 Alpini [Alpine Light Infantry] from all over Italy for one of the largest gatherings in the last few years. The message “EXPO 2008” framed City Hall every evening at 8:00 pm and was switched off at dawn.
Fabio Guastini, an executive of GIEMME Allestimenti, the service that, together with the Altair company of Pietro Tondello, managed the project and looked after the installation told us: “We took advantage of the Alpini event held at the same time to give exceptional prominence to Trieste’s candidature for Expo 2008. Technically, I used 8 Stage Zoom 1200 projectors from Clay Paky, each of which created the outline of a letter or number and projected it from a considerable distance. We wanted to make the projection dynamic so we used alternations of colours, fade-outs and prisms that certainly gave a sort of appeal to the message”.
The Stage Zoom 1200s were installed at a height of 4 metres, on several scaffoldings protected from the rain. “The projectors always behaved perfectly – continued Guastini – even though they worked for over 10 hours a day for a month and a half. I have been using Clay Paky products for many years for light displays of all types, from concerts to musical and fashion events, to exhibitions, and they have always proved to be highly reliable”. Another 3 Stage Zoom 1200s have been installed near the Province Hall onto which are projected, and be will projected for another 6 months, a globe of the world with Trieste at its centre.
At the same time as Trieste, Paris, too, promoted its candidature for Expo 2008 using Italian material: several Stage Zoom 1200 were used to project the message of the event in some of the most central areas of the city. In this case the installation was managed by the Publiesse company of Renato Spaventa.