OK on the last entry I suggested that I had not met sculpture as lighting before. Then I just remembered the Jack light by Tom Dixon. It’s described as a ‘sitting, stacking, lighting thing’, and at first sight you would not think it a light. Its more of a stool / sculpture that just happens to double as a light. It reminds me of something I recently saw on ebay – a Kartell ‘Bubble Club’ sofa which the owner had cut a small hole in the back and stuck a light bulb inside it…. Does that make the sofa a light as well? And yes the Jack light is a piece of plastic furniture with a light stuck inside it, but it’s now an icon of modern design as proven by the fact that you can now buy a 12cm replica in solid copper from Heals.

So checking Pinterest for ‘sculptural lighting‘ turns up a very long list of lights which are a bit sculptural, but definitely lights. But then if you hang it from the ceiling on a piece of electrical flex, its a bit of a giveaway. Wall mounted is easier since its not that unusual to have wall mounted sculpture. One good example would be the ‘Yet’ wall light from Foscarini – it looks like a plastic letter Y, is available in different colours, and looks best when combined in groups. But free standing objects such as the OUPS I mentioned in my last post give the most freedom to expand the ‘sculpture as lighting’ boundaries. After 5 minutes scanning through the Google images for ‘sculpture as lighting’, I find it hard to find something that is not a ‘light sculpture’ in some way. The majority are sculptures which use light as their main medium, or possibly as an extra bit of ‘wow’ factor. I did however find one sculpture where the lighting aspect is integral to the meaning of the piece, and that is ‘Expansion’ by Paige Bradley. Possibly the perfect mix of sculpture and light IMHO.