Focus week: Laban

For this Focus week i wanted to look at modern installations that use lighting in there design as well as projections. I begun by looking at the Laban center which is one of London's leading institutions for dance artist training and one of the world's largest venues for contemporary dance.

In 1997 Swiss Architects Herzog & de Meuron won the international design competition to build the new Laban Building. The architects are Pritzker Prize winners (2001) for their redevelopment of Tate Modern. Situated on a 2-acre site beside Deptford Creek in South East London, the building creates a powerful, highly visible focus for the ongoing physical and social regeneration of Deptford and the surrounding area.



The visual artist, Michael Craig- Martin, collaborated with the architects Herzog & de Meuron on the bold decorative scheme for Laban's exterior and on some elements of the interior design. the 7800m squared structure is clad in a revolutionary semi-translucent, colored polycarbonate punctuated by large clear windows. The polycarbonate cloaks the building in semitransparent shades of lime, turquoise and magenta. Michael Craig-Martin previously worked with Herzog & de Meuron on the polycarbonate box which illuminates the top of the chimney at Tate Modern In London.

I found the way simple materials have been used to create an illuminated wall helps in corresponding to my design principles for that of the New Photographers Gallery in Ramillies Street.