Gali May Lucas
Three figures are sitting next to each other on a bench, hunched over, heads bent, faces lit up only by the screens they’re looking at. A familiar image, this typical smartphone user’s body posture. Isolated from others, mentally buried in a virtual world; ‘Absorbed by Light’, as Lucas aptly named her artwork.
Lucas wants to create awareness for the effect that this posture has on others. That’s what drove her decision to make the artwork interactive, by leaving one seat on the bench open. “My installation shows the enormous impact light has on our daily lives,” says Lucas.
“I think light is one of the most powerful mediums we have.”
We asked her how she sees the future of light art: “I think light is one of the most powerful mediums we have,” she answers. “As the effects light can have on us become ever more apparent, the art form can only continue to grow.”
The impact of light was most apparent to her when she saw Olafur Eliassons’s ‘The Weather Project’ at Tate Modern. “The way in which light can be used as such a powerful tool to captivate an audience really resonated with me. It was a moment in which you felt connected with strangers through an art installation. The scale of the artwork made you feel rather small in comparison; it was a special, shared experience.”