Shylight

A KINETIC INSTALLATION OF LIGHT AND MOVEMENT

Materials: aluminum, polished stainless steel, silk, LEDs, robotics.
Shylight, by DRIFT  

Certain types of flowers close at night, for self-defence and to conserve their resources. This highly evolved natural mechanism is called ‘nyctinasty’ and inspired DRIFT to create Shylight, a sculpture that unfolds and retreats to its original state to make a fascinating choreography, mirroring the nyctinasty of real flowers. Man-made objects tend to have a static form, while everything natural in this world, including people, are subject to constant metamorphosis and adaptation to their surroundings. Shylight is the result to the question “how an inanimate object can mimic those changes that express character and emotions”? 

After a research period of five years, DRIFT created the perfect form to visualise their concept. Shylight has become an object that feels alive because of unpredictable, natural-looking movements: it descends while blossoming in all its glorious beauty, only to subsequently close and retreat upward again. Shylight is created out of many layers of silk, which causes it to move with the grace of a dancer. The movement of the work can be controlled to the millimetre and gives it a subtle choreography. 

Shylight has been acquired by Rijksmuseum Amsterdam – The Netherlands to form part of their permanent collection.

Read more: 
Wallpaper – All things bright and technica;: nature and machanice combine in DRIFT’s Rijksmuseum installation
Whitewall – Founders Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta Discuss Design and Drifter
Dezeen – DRIFT installs moving Shylights in disused Eindhoven building, Dutch Design Week
Designboom – DRIFT’s dancing flowers ‘shylight’ gracefully bounce in new york city ballet