up dates    (for the background into this project please click on Eurythmy lighting Foundation Stone)   

2-5^th of January 08 Technical trials, without eurythmists. Three volunteers and myself had the exciting time to actually try out the real silk curtains on stage, at the Merlin Theatre in Sheffield. (it was Freezing!)    rigging  lights 

  The silk curtains are hung up for the first time, this takes two and half days in the freezing theatre. We have to perfect this set up, and get it down to 2 hours!  This is the first attempt to see what they look like and to see how the Habotai silk curtains behave.  How are we going to hold them up on tour in different venues? Will they blow around? We have only seen light on a small model, how will this larger set up take the light? What are the problems we might have with hiding the light source? Rear back and front lights are focused on to the rear 3 layers of silk curtain from above and on the floor in several colours, this arrangement is also used on the side curtains. The idea is for the stage to become a translucent space, with no obvious entrances (wings) but still the eurythmists have to come on and off (walking backwards) and not trip up!       

We did take some photos, they always show a watered down version of the real thing, the photos showed hot spots from the lights, this can hardly be seen by the naked eye. 

I want to get the eurythmist to just appear in the centre up stage out of a light filled space, and return to a light filled space, not as a silhouette against a light background or as a stage effect, but as a natural dissolve. This first attempt is almost working, some of the lighting is working better than the model, and some is behaving just like the model, so in between sessions at the Merlin I can play with my metre high model in my workshop, to try out different colour filters, I am also using pastel colours as well as dark saturated ones, which opens up a whole new colour light palette. I will keep you informed of developments as we progress.  John Watson