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Exhibition Designers
& Lighting @ China Exchange
After the huge success of the photographic exhibition of Thomas Child’s at the China Exchange a year earlier. The same New York collector envisaged a new exhibition based on the photographic works of William Saunders.
A British born photographer working in Shanghai, William Saunders produced mainly portraits but also local events and scenery around the 1870’s. The exhibition presented 33 images of which 27 had been hand coloured producing unbelievably fine detailed photographs.
With the significance of these exceptional photographic images of every day Chinese life, Asian Art in London held their official opening at the China Exchange. Asian Art in London brings together the world’s top dealers, major auction houses and museums for an event of the finest Asian art. So this provided the perfect opportunity for VIP guests from around the art world to view these important historical photographic images.
SMA designers were asked once again to work as exhibition and lighting designers on this important photographic exhibition project. Around the 1870's the Collodion wet plate cameras were the new technology of the time. The exhibition curator wanted to add something special to the display to assist visitors in better understand the environment in which these photographic images would have been created.
The exhibition curator had the idea to recreate a Victorian photographic studio similar in type to those being used by photographers around that period. However at the suggestion of one of our exhibition designers, it was decided not to produce an exact period replica of a photographic studio but something more of an art installation.
By adopting our exhibition designers approach it would improve continuity and cohesiveness with the rest of the photographic exhibition layout. Different positions within the exhibition space were tested along with various designs for the studio until the final version seen in these images was agreed.
China Exchange equipped with only ambient uplighters and the lack of any track or directional lighting is not ideal for art installations or exhibitions. With this in mind our lighting designers used a temporary 12 volt tensioned wired lighting system which we had developed on a previous exhibition. This was installed and utilised 3000K, CRI 95 LED lamps and fittings. Our lighting designers added various light filters to the LED lamps to change beam angle and intensity, whilst light levels (Lux) were measured an adjusted to agreed tolerances.
The photographic studio & exhibition were a huge success with an enormous increase in visitor numbers from the previous year’s exhibition.
Everyone connected with the project were delighted to read the many compliments scribbled in the visitor’s book by the general public, guests and scholars alike. We look forward to designing next year’s exhibition which potentially will go one step further with a completely new exhibition layout and entrance.
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