Light Music Exhibition Visual Identity

Art Direction: Dermot MacCormack
Photography: Austen Hart
Deliverables: Catalogue, Website, Animation, Wayfinding, AR Poster

Light Music is an exhibition created by Brian Eno, pioneer of ambient music, and visual art. The exhibition consists of light boxes that continuously change colors activated by the viewer when the stand in front of the art. Bursts of color woven into sleek, refined, branding let the viewer understand that color and light are the stars of the show.

Exhibition Catalogue

When workshopping this catalogue, I started to brainstorm the exhibition from a conceptual standpoint. What is Light Music all about? Some of the main take-aways I had during this process were introspection, meditation, and finding stillness. The viewer of the exhibition is meant to take their time, and spend a few minutes at each piece. Looking at each light box in a meditative stillness brings the viewer to a place of peace and introspection, helping them get away from the outside world. I decided the best way for me to convey this one-on-one relationship between the viewer and the art, was to have loose pages rather than a traditional binding. The pages have no set order, so they can be taken out, rearranged, and appreciated on their own. The next step was content research, sketches, and brain-storming to decide what materials would work best to communicate my concept.

I decided on a sleek black case to encapsulate the catalog much the same way the darkened exhibition space creates an atmosphere for the light pieces to shine. The reflective black and white type alludes to the glow of the art pieces. The catalogue also features colored film that creates beautiful color shifts that change when reordered, creating an infinite playground of color options that the viewer can create. The back of eight of the pages placed together recreates one of Eno’s light boxes, shown below.

Wayfinding and Promotion

The wayfinding I designed for Light Music features changing color and shape, Eno’s ‘Music for Installations,’ as well as prompts from Eno’s ‘Oblique Strategies’ cards that challenge people to look at creativity in a new way. Promotions include a website, an animated metro advertisement, and a promotional video. 

Oblique Strategies

Oblique Strategies, Over One Hundred Worthwhile Dilemmas, is a deck of cards created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt, published in 1975. The cards feature kooky creative prompts to tackle when you might be stuck in a creative rut. I featured prompts from these cards throughout the exhibition’s branding forcing you to look at something in a new light, similar to the experience you might have through introspection and meditation. Hopefully, Light Music will make you connect to a new perspective through introspection, light healing, and experiencing stillness. The prompts appear on pages in the catalogue, the home and contact pages of the website, and in the exhibition’s way-finding system. “Turn it upside down,” and other prompts with projected arrows lead the exhibition attendee through the gallery space. 

Promotional Video

Exhibition Website