ARTEMIDE’S LIGHTING INSTALLATION AT THE CLERKENWELL DESIGN WEEK

On occasion of the Clerkenwell Design Week in London, Artemide, the Italian brand internationally recognized for its know-how in the lighting industry, will present a scenographic installation where the new Funivia, will be the main character in the fascinating background of the House of Detention, the former Victorian prisons.

Designed by Carlotta de Bevilaqua, CEO and President of Artemide, Funivia is a functional network of tangible and intangible relations that is free and inclusive and can evolve through the cooperation of its elements. It starts out from the essential, with a “mountaineering” spirit, discovering a new level of freedom of light in spaces.

A rope, the cable that supplies the energy and the nails, the elements used to fix within space, form the basis with which to make great progress, going far beyond the limits dictated by the rigidity of systems. The cable, with a special minimum section that can withstand mechanical tension and thermal stress, is the channel that distributes the system’s energy and the key element to which the lighting elements connect.

The cable runs uninterruptedly through space, overcoming the limits of the three dimensions. It is fixed separately, to the floor or ceiling, using mechanical elements. It runs within, without needing to be cut and therefore interrupted, forming a network of regular horizontal or vertical, as well as freely inclined, lines in the space.

From a single power point, it can run infinitely with the only limit being the power installed on its length. In the flexibility and freedom, “interferences” can be generated between two systems that touch each other, criss-crossing in a connection that enables two cables to pass through.

It is not bound to an electricity grid or a predefined project; it can enter any space at any time and design light with the utmost freedom; it can generate an extraordinary quality of performance, even without a specific system or intervention in space being envisaged.

A structure is thus created that can integrate different light performances and management intelligence.

The light elements are connected to the cable via a “bridge” element, a sort of electricity connection that mechanically fixes the appliance and takes the energy from the cable to power it. The system is inclusive, housing products that already exist; the cable connection module is a universal system that translates energy into a Esperanto of light.

The cable is the physical network that distributes energy; the universal coupling is the site of the nodes of an intangible network, the BLL signal through which all appliances can dialogue with the whole system. By integrating sensors, Funivia can also open up to parametric environmental interaction.

In this digital network too, each appliance has its own identity, its own IP address through which it can be managed with the Artemide App.

Funivia has the intelligence to include very different properties; it is a free and interpretable interface, which is transversal, welcoming and accessible.

It is a principle that is sustainable on a production level, in distribution, installation, consumption, use and the integration of existing elements, without necessarily having to create additional new products.

Funivia breaks a common scheme to existing lighting systems, relegating the rigidity of fixed modules (in space, stock and production) to a thing of the past.

In Funivia, innovation is a sustainable dialogue that overcomes the limits of all spaces.

NOTES FOR THE EDITORS

House of Detention, 12 Sans Walk, EC1R 0AS

Light + Rising Star

Stand P3

24 - 26 May 2022

PRESS PREVIEW: Tuesday 24 May