Sustainability Sees the Light at Singapore’s Marina Bay

Asia’s first and only sustainable
light art festival – i Light Marina Bay 2012 – will return next year from 9 March
to 1 April, with the theme “Light Meets Asia”, featuring innovative and
environmentally sustainable light art installations by 30 multi-disciplinary
artists, including Coral Gardens (pictured left) by French-Filipino artist
Olivia d’Aboville. There are messages about sustainability, as well as climate
change and deforestation, in the exhibition of “The Chronicles of Narnia”,
designed by Robin Stapley (pictured at right), which is currently running at
Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.

Asia’s first sustainable light
art festival shines the spotlight on Marina Bay

Singapore, 8 December 2011 – i
Light Marina Bay 2012, the second edition of Asia’s first and only sustainable
light art festival, will return next year from 9 March to 1 April 2012.  Themed “Light Meets Asia”, i Light Marina Bay
2012 will feature innovative and environmentally sustainable light art
installations by 30 multi-disciplinary artists, with a strong focus on works
from Asia.  Organised by the Urban
Redevelopment Authority (URA) in collaboration with Smart Light Singapore, the
2012 Festival builds on the success of last year’s festival.

Mr Mark Goh, Deputy Director of
URA’s Place Management Department, remarked: “We are glad to bring this
festival back to Marina Bay for the second time.  i Light Marina Bay provides a great
opportunity for locals and tourists to come down to appreciate the creative
light art installations and explore our city’s signature waterfront.  i Light Marina Bay also aims to promote the
awareness and use of energy-efficient technology so that we can all play a part
in creating a more sustainable urban environment.

The Festival’s curatorial team is
helmed by Festival Director Ms Mary-Anne Kyriakou, and includes two
co-curators: Ms Charmaine Toh, a Singapore visual arts curator; and the team
from local award-winning design studio FARM.
In line with the theme “Light Meets Asia”, the curatorial team has
selected 30 light art installations from almost one hundred submissions.  The list of selected installations features a
strong representation from new, emerging, and well-known artists from countries
across Asia, including Singapore.  See
Annex A for more information about the curatorial team.

“The success of the inaugural
event in 2010 has drawn strong participation from the creative industry in the
upcoming Festival.  We are very heartened
by both the number and quality of submissions this year.  We saw not only a significant increase but
the quality also sets a new benchmark for future Festivals.  This time round, the event will have a
stronger Asian focus featuring more Asian multi-disciplinary artists, many of
whom will be creating light art for the very first time,” said Festival
Director Ms Mary-Anne Kyriakou.

Ten artists and their works were
unveiled at the media conference held at the ArtScience Museum at Marina Bay Sands
this morning.  Five of the featured
artists were in attendance: Mr Li Hui from China; Ms Olivia d’Aboville from the
Philippines; Mr Takahiro Matsuo from Japan, and Mr Ryf Zaini and Ms Olivia Lee
from Singapore.  See Annex B for details
of the artists and their artworks.

The Festival has also seen strong
support from the Marina Bay community, with Marina Bay Sands coming on board as
the first sponsor.  Mr George
Tanasijevich, President and CEO of Marina Bay Sands, said: “It has been our
privilege to play a key role in the transformation of Marina Bay, Singapore’s
most exciting urban district.  It is
therefore an honour for us to contribute back to the community through this
innovative showcase of artistic talents at Asia’s premier light art festival.  We are happy to give our support to pave the
way for a bolder show at i Light Marina Bay 2012.”

Apart from the visually arresting
and interactive sustainable light art installations, visitors to next year’s i
Light Marina Bay can look forward to a full array of complementary programmes
and activities – including a night picnic and carnival, outdoor performances,
guided light walk tours, educational talks and workshops – all to ensure that
there is something for everyone.

i Light Marina Bay will open nightly
from 7.30pm to 11.00pm from 9 March to 1 April 2012.

About Urban Redevelopment
Authority (URA)

The Urban Redevelopment Authority
(URA) is Singapore’s national land use planning and conservation agency. URA’s
mission is “to make Singapore a great city to live, work and play in”. We
strive to create a vibrant and sustainable city of distinction by planning and
facilitating Singapore’s physical development in partnership with the
community. As the main land sales agent for the state, our multifaceted engagement
strategy includes the sale of state land to attract and channel private capital
investment to develop sites for meeting our land use needs. As the place
manager for Marina Bay, we promote exciting activities within Marina Bay in
collaboration with other government agencies and private stakeholders. To
create an exciting cityscape, URA also actively promotes architecture and urban
design excellence. For more information, please visit us at www.ura.gov.sg.

About Smart Light Singapore

Smart Light Singapore (SLS) was
established in 2010 as a not-for-profit entity to develop urban lighting
festivals that would set new international standards for energy efficiency and
provide family-friendly, outdoor celebrations by illuminating public spaces
through art sculptures and other smart light activities.

Through these events and
activities, SLS aims to increase awareness in the reduction of energy usage,
engage public and professional participation in best practices in lighting
design, promote dark city skies and improve on energy-efficient lighting
performances.

A feature of the press conference
launch of I Light Marina Bay was the only one of the selected 30 works on
display – Coral Gardens by French-Filipino artist Olivia d’Aboville.

She graduated with honours from
Duperré, a prestigious Textile Design school in Paris in 2009 and Olivia
D’Aboville specialised in tapestry and textile structures. She rapidly adapted
the techniques to create her own woven forms. She has been exploring sculpting
with textile techniques since then and had her first solo exhibition Chasm of
Fantasies at the Ayala Museum in Manila, the Philippines, in 2010. She was
nominated and shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards 2011.

From plastic spoons to pins and
water bottles, d’Aboville is fascinated by ordinary mass-produced objects.
These objects, due to our society and our lifestyle, are inevitably destroying
our environment and polluting our seas. She manipulates materials at hand to
create new work, recycling them to generate objects which are completely
different. For every interesting element which inspires her, d’Aboville asks
herself what she can do this it: can it be cut, bent, heated, stretched, or
accumulated to create a new form?

D’Aboville is very sensitive to
light, fluidity and movement and finds endless inspiration from the ocean. She
is fascinated by the mystery, beauty and creatures of the underwater world and
tries to raise awareness about the importance of preserving marine biodiversity
through her work. Her work has been exhibited in museums, galleries, hotels and
festivals in France, Hong Kong, Manila and the United States. It ranges from
textile jewellery to sculptures, lighting design and installation art.

Concept

Coral reefs form some of the most
diverse and productive ecosystems on earth. They occupy less than a tenth of 1%
of the ocean surface, yet provide as home for 25% of all marine species.
However, coral reefs are fragile ecosystems which are dying. They are under
threat from climate change, ocean acidification, blast fishing, over-use of
reef resources, urban and agricultural runoff and water pollution.

Coral Garden is an installation
of a multitude of coral-like sculptures made of transparent cocktail stirrers
and an acrylic base. The composition of the sculptures resembles a coral reef
which viewers will be drawn to and can interact with, as fish do with actual
reefs.

Source: www.ilightmarinabay.sg

Note from the Editor: We must declare our interest! Sustain Ability
Showcase Asia (SASA) has been appointed the Sustainability Consultants for i Light
Marina Bay 2012, working with Pico, the event management company, as well as
the URA,  the Festival Director Mary-Anne
Kyriakou and Smart Light Singapore.

Kimberly Spykerman in Straits
Times (3 December 2011):

There are messages about sustainability,
climate change and deforestation in the exhibition of The Chronicles of Narnia,
designed by Robin Stapley (pictured at right), which is currently running at
Marina Bay Sands in Singapore

Feel the icy chill of the White
Witch’s throne, the weight of a heavy suit of armour and watch how a catapult
is used to launch a huge boulder in a battle.

Visitors can get up close and
personal with these interactive elements when The Chronicles Of Narnia
exhibition opens at the Marina Bay Sands skating rink today.

The show features more than 100
costumes, props and set pieces from the three Narnia films, based on C.S.
Lewis’ books, which trace the adventures of four children after they enter the
magical world of Narnia through a wardrobe.

Fans of the films who walk
through the doors of the ‘wardrobe’ at the show will find many familiar items.
These include the elaborate dress and headgear worn by the White Witch, played
by Tilda Swinton; the battlegear and weapons used by the characters; and the
life-sized petrified animals found in the courtyard of the White Witch’s
palace.

Even the homes of the beavers and
Mr Tumnus the faun, featured in the first film The Lion, The Witch And The
Wardrobe (2005), have been recreated, and contain original film props such as
silverware, furniture and even an arrest warrant.

The exhibition also houses a
study containing items belonging to the writer of the beloved children’s
series. These include a pipe, a glass mug, a handwritten letter and a copy of
the book Phantastes by Scottish writer George Macdonald, which C.S. Lewis said
‘baptised his imagination’.

The exhibition’s creative
director, Mr Robin Stapley, 47, said: ‘These real elements help the audience to
connect to the writer and give them a sense of the world he lived in. After
all, these books came out of his imagination.’

THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE
EXHIBITION

Source: www.marinabaysands.com