NDYLIGHT was appointed as the lead designer / artist for the sculptural light installation, “Downpour”, in the atrium at 485 La Trobe Street as part of a design competition. The space in which the installation was proposed had a range of challenges to overcome, principally the physical height of the space and the presence of beam smoke detection above a certain level.
To overcome this, NDYLIGHT looked at a layered installation of concentric blue neon rings mounted on a 5m x 4m grid within the space, with two variable sized rings in each location. Each ring is individually suspended to a different height to physically represent an abstraction of a raindrop falling in a puddle. To support the rings in each location a grid of catenary cables was selected as the best solution to address both the height and services limitations of the space.
The linear grid catenary spans the atrium at a level just below the lowest smoke detector and creates an almost invisible network of mounting points for the rings.
Nic Burnham, NDYLight
Photos ©NDY
