| contact name | Kevin McCormick |
| artists' names | Kevin McCormick |
| artists' locations | Cambridge, MA USA |
| art name | Corona |
| art media | naked electronics, LEDs |
| art dimensions | 1 foot sphere, hung from a 3/8" cable. Approximately 2 pounds. |
| art date | 2003 |
| art description | Corona began as an engineering experiment, to explore the
potential of a new microchip developed by Color Kinetics Inc. of
Boston, for whom I work. The tiny chip, coupled with one or more
equally tiny red-green-blue colored LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes),
permits the synthesis and variation of over 64 billion colors of light
under the control of a computer, in a space the size of a pencil
eraser. Armed with this technology, I set out to create a device that
simultaneously proved the performance of the chip, that was
aesthetically interesting, and that up until this point was
technically very difficult to build. The result was Corona.
Corona is constructed entirely of the materials of modern
electronics. 180 triangular circuit boards interlock, edge to edge, to
form a geodesic sphere. Under computer control, directional red,
green and blue LEDs on each board project 180 spots of saturated color
onto walls, ceiling and floor, undulating, sweeping and fading. The
sphere itself is brilliantly bright, but appears to be an
ultra-minimal video display; viewing pixels on a sphere is a bit like
viewing a globe in oneﾕs hands rather than a paper map of Earth. It
could serve as a ``lamp'' in the sense of something that provides
illumination, but no chandelier or stage luminaire can compare.
To the engineer, Corona is an ingenious device, carefully crafted. To
the artist, it is a pleasing form built in the medium of naked
technology. To the pragmatist, it is a new kind of light, one more
nail in the coffin of Edisonﾕs incandescent bulb. |
| art proposal | Corona began as an electrical engineering experiment, to explore the
potential of a brand-new microchip developed by my employer, Color
Kinetics Inc. of Boston. The tiny chip, coupled with one or more equally tiny
red-green-blue colored LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes), permits the synthesis
and variation of over 64 billion colors of light under the control of a
computer, in a space the size of a pencil eraser. Armed with this technology,
I set out to create a device that simultaneously proved the performance of
the chip, that was aesthetically interesting, and that up until this point was
technically very difficult to build. The result was Corona, completed in 2003.
Corona is constructed entirely of the materials of modern electronics. 180
triangular circuit boards interlock, edge to edge, to form a geodesic sphere.
On each circuit board are seven directional red, green and blue LEDs. Under
computer control, 180 spots of saturated color project onto walls, ceiling and
floor, undulating, sweeping and fading. The sphere itself is brilliantly bright,
but appears to be an ultra-minimal video display; viewing pixels on a sphere
is a bit like viewing a globe in one's hands rather than a paper map of Earth.
It could serve as a "lamp" the sense of something that provides
illumination, but no chandelier or stage luminaire can compare.
To the engineer, Corona is an ingenious device, carefully crafted. To the
artist, it is a pleasing form built in the medium of naked technology. To the
pragmatist, it is a new kind of light, one more nail in the coffin of Edison's
incandescent bulb. |
| art placard | Corona is a geodesic sphere constructed entirely of
printed circuit boards and light-emitting diodes. Serving as both a
lamp and a three-dimensional display, its 180 LED clusters can take on
and project any color of the rainbow under real-time computer control.
Corona throws off the bonds of the hot and bulky incandescent bulb,
and imagines what our lighting fixtures might be like in the
networked, semiconducting future. |