LIGHTING A FOREST OF SCULPTURES

On 6 February 2008, the exhibition of Simon Spierer’s sculpture collection, “A Forest of Sculptures”, was inaugurated by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dora Bakoyannis, at the “Athinais” cultural centre in Votanikos. The exhibition began its journey from the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Darmstadt for the first time, and is to be shown in many major cities around the world.

“I can’t imagine life without art,” declared the internationally known tobacco merchant, who was born in Trieste in 1926 to an Austro-Hungarian Jewish family. He lost his father at a very young age, while his mother and sister were persecuted and imprisoned in Bergen-Belsen until the end of the war. He escaped to Switzerland with his grandmother and later made his fortune in the tobacco trade in Virginia, USA. After the Second World War he began collecting paintings and opened a gallery in Geneva.

After his wife’s death, he did not hesitate to sell all the valuable paintings he owned in order to turn to sculpture. He gathered works by the greatest international sculptors and at some point realised that they resembled trees. He even placed them in the living room of his house in such a way that visitors had to pass carefully between them. After his death, and in accordance with his wishes, the sculpture collection was donated to the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Darmstadt. Visitors have the opportunity to see exceptional sculptures signed by Brancusi, Gonzalez, Arp, Ernst, Henry Moore, Fontana, Giacometti, Bourgeois, Armitage, Croissant, Takis, Trubbiani, Fernagu, Pan, Bill, Pomodoro, DePury and others. They are made of different materials and come in a variety of sizes, but they all have something in common: a slender, tree-like stance. Directly opposite them hangs a painting by Andy Warhol in which the collector poses between his two beloved Labrador dogs. This painting was the beginning of a great friendship with Warhol, whom he met in person when he asked him to paint his two four-legged companions.

When it became known that the exhibition would travel to many European capitals, the founders and owners of Athinais, Marilena Mamidaki-Kokkinea and Nasos Kokkineas, made every effort to have it hosted in the cultural centre they have created with hard work and dedication over almost a decade in Votanikos. In Athens, a (deliberately chaotic) arrangement similar to the one the collector had in his living room was not feasible, mainly to protect the sculptures from the hundreds of visitors who would crowd the space. Nevertheless, the exhibition at Athinais, curated by the well-known art critic and art historian Takis Mavrotas, loses none of its magic.

The lighting of the sculptures was designed by lighting consultant Kostas Kapos, with the aim of achieving the evocative atmosphere appropriate to such a collection of world-famous works of art. Mr Kapos, joining the efforts of the founders of Athinais to bring these important sculptures closer to the Athenian public, offered his services free of charge, while the company Diathlasis, through one of its owners, Mr P. Ioannidis, supplied the iGuzzini luminaires needed to complete the lighting installation.

Lighting an exhibition like this presents many challenges. The variety of sculptures and the materials used (bronze, copper, oxidised iron, Plexiglas, wood, stainless steel, etc.) requires each piece to be considered individually. One sculpture calls for intense, pinpoint lighting, another for diffuse lighting, and another for light from specific angles so that the texture and relief of its material are revealed. Moreover, since the layout chosen by Takis Mavrotas aims to maximise the aesthetic result and the thematic groupings, the lighting designer has to apply a multitude of different accent lighting solutions to sculptures placed very close to one another in the same space. To achieve this, the choice was Tecnica three-circuit universal track projectors by iGuzzini, mostly narrow-beam because of the great height of the spaces, fitted with 90W halogen lamps and with dimming and adjustable beam width, together with 12V halogen spot luminaires.

It goes without saying that any solution worked out theoretically on paper would have failed. The whole undertaking demanded continual and laborious climbing up and down the ladders by the lighting designer, until the ideal result was achieved for each sculpture individually. The layout of the spaces, with their high-ceilinged halls, proved ideal for achieving the desired result, but rather tiring for the writer’s knees.

We hope that the final result did justice both to us and to the wonderful sculptures on display. The writer extends warm thanks to Mr Nasos Kokkineas, Takis Mavrotas and the architect and colour consultant Giannis Bavarezos for their help and unstinting support.

Kostas Kapos
CKLD – Architectural Lighting Consultants
kapos@tee.gr