Saatchi Gallery

The former military building was converted into a gallery for contemporary art. Optec and Stella wallwashers provide vertical lighting for the exhibition rooms.

The Duke of York's Headquarters located on King's Road in Chelsea, London, is home for one of the world's most interesting galleries. The gallery's curator is advertising guru and art collector Charles Saatchi, whose flair for unusual and shocking exhibition concepts always causes a sensation in the contemporary art scene. Large, hall-like rooms covering 6,500 square metres give the artists ample space to present their works, which include provocative, strange or over-sized installations.

The Chinese artist-duo Peng Yu and Sun Yuan arranged the "Old Persons Home" installation (above) in which 13 life-like latex dolls seated on wheelchairs ride this way and that in seemingly uncontrolled disarray. With appearances resembling politicians such as Arafat or Castro, this is a subtle installation that takes up the theme of the transience of power and influence.

Optec wallwashers were mounted throughout the entire building and generate a clear and radiant atmosphere in the exhibition rooms. The uniformly washlit wall surfaces provide the optimum backdrop for the presentation of the artworks.

In many of the rooms, diffusely illuminated ceilings known as "light boxes" give the impression of open skylights. A flexible material is stretched across the openings and fluorescent lamps are mounted in the intermediate ceiling space. The track, the spotlights and the luminous ceilings are all controlled via a Light System DALI installation.

Light Changers are positioned in each of the exhibition rooms as control panels for the Light System DALI and provide user-friendly access to the lighting functions. The Light Changers have a USB connection so that a laptop PC containing the ERCO Light Studio software can be connected to set up the DALI system and configure the light scenes.

The DALI Light Changer with touchscreen technology provides access to the light scenes and timer programs saved in the Light Server.

The diffuse lighting of the luminous ceilings provides ambient luminescence. This corresponds excellently with the light of the fitted Optec wallwashers and can be perfectly adjusted using the DALI system.