Star dust! By Lisa Boissy & Laura Malroux

The Pleiades

“My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations” said John Green in The fault in Our Stars. 

A constellation is a group of stars in the celestial sphere which make up a particular form that humans have named. Scientists and astrologers are fond of watching and studying them because they are spectacular, majestic and magical!  Because they are inaccessible, people find them intriguing. There is a mystery about them that inspires not just scientists but artists too…

The constellations have inspired an innovative art project using light and dance: The Pleiades by the dance company Enra.

The choreographer and dancer Yasuku Mochizuki was inspired by the story of the Pleiades. Orion decided to hunt the Pleiades: seven sisters and their mother. To save their lives, the girls implored the Gods who made them first into doves and then into constellations. In the show, we recognize the story.

Mochizuki uses light in all his shows: Torque Starter, Primitive, etc. Light is the Enra trademark.

Primitive

In The Pleiades, combining elements of dance, performance art, music, technology, light and more, the versatile Japanese troupe has made magic. The show tells us an incredible story. Thanks to the stage’s emptiness and simplicity the spectator is flabbergasted by the dancers’ performances. The two graceful dancers, Saya Watatani and Maki Yokoyami, are perfectly coordinated with the light. Light becomes a partner, a friend. During the show, we are always wondering if it is it the dancer who leads the light or the light which leads the dancer.

It is a really original performance. Different constellations are included and are in perfect harmony with the reality. The stage is plunged into darkness, and the only light source is the constellation. So, we are impressed: we can see all the dance figures because the light follows the dancers. Furthermore, Saya and Maki perform in unison and with the light. Everyone has his own interpretation and his own feelings. There dancers make it spectacular, just like the constellations! There is also curiosity: the spectator wants to see more after each move! In fact, all the emotions can be felt: pleasure, satisfaction, excitement...

Here, the light doesn’t only represent the different constellations of the Pleiades, but also the Northern Lights and water splashing. So light is diverted from its principal function. That’s the major characteristic of art, to make us see things differently. The movements are simple, but perfectly done. It’s a delight to the eyes. Moreover, the chief attraction of this show is surely the fact that the dancers seem to control all this light power and, suddenly, it’s dark and we just see the shining constellations.

Torque Starter

Even the people who are not very interested by constellations learn a lot about them, while being happy to learn. Even those not very fond of dance find it interesting because it shows them a new generation of dancers and performances.

“Wow!” is what everyone says after having seen the show. If you have not seen it yet, go!

Shady art... By Ines Petit & Liz Gorsen

Light is the opposite of shadow, isn’t it? But Diet Wiegman, an artist from The Netherland, disagrees. This multidisciplinary visual artist uses light to create perfect shadows out of second-hand objects.

                                                                                                      

Wiegman was born on the 24^th January 1944 and grew up in an artistic environment as his father and grandfather were artists too. He studied at the Rotterdam Academy of Arts for four years.

Diet Wiegman in 2012

In his early twenties, he acquired fame as a progressive ceramist because of his truly realistic pieces that could not be distinguished from real objects.

A bulging bag (made of clay) which should go on a "diet"!

Diet Wiegman in 1984, Berlin

           

Because of his work in a multitude of disciplines, he's referred to as an "art omnivore" and launched an art movement which is named after him. His international breakthrough came about because of his ingenious shadow and light sculptures also known as shadow art.

The concept is about illuminating waste objects to create a contrasting image in the form of a highly detailed shadow.

Trashed!

Wiegman was a pioneer. By working with light and shadows for almost forty years, he has inspired a lot of artists through the years.

Deadly night shade...

When people ask him about his work, he simply replies: "I did not invent the phenomenon of shadow; I just make holes in the light!”

Moon(light)walk!

He loves to create art which goes against clichés, laughs at his own seriousness, and makes contradictions in his art. Sometimes it's physical: he destroys his own work to recreate new sculptures made out of the fragments.

Beastly beauty...

You don't need expensive materials to create a beautiful art project... Why not try doing a Wiegman-type work of art yourself?!

Optical illusions! By Marion Nairabeze, Maëlle Rivalier & Camille Simonet

Click on this! http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/

First, look at these optical illusions:

 Who do you see? Monroe or Einstein?

Is it Gala or Lincoln?

An old couple or a guitarist and a woman?

What do you see?

In what direction is the train going? Difficult to guess, right?

Second, a short explanation of how vision works for curious people:

Click on this! http://www.acnr.co.uk/pdfs/volume6issue2/v6i2visual.pdf

Optical illusions are misperceptions of form, color, size or movement of objects. They are, for the eye, an altered perception of reality.

The eyes behave more or less like a camera. The eye has a diaphragm, an iris which lets in more or less light as it opens or closes. Behind the iris, a deformable lens, called the crystalline, allows the images to be formed on a sensitive membrane: the retina

The retina consists of rods and cones. Cones allow diurnal vision (color). There are three types of cones, receptive to red, green, blue. Rods allow night vision.

Under the influence of the light that enters through the iris, the rods and cones produce small amounts of energy and nerve impulses which are passed on up to the brain by the optical nerve. The brain then analyzes the information.

Optical illusions are errors of interpretation of our brain which tries to give meaning to all the information which is received even if there is none. This results in amplification of contrasts, creating contours, colors, perspectives, reliefs, etc.

Third, an explanation of an illusion:

1) Primary or geometric illusions

These illusions occur when the eye stops only on certain parts of the image (angles, symmetry axes, breaks lines). Then, these areas become more important than others, such as in the Titchener illusion.

2) Effect of angles

We underestimate obtuse angles and overestimate sharp corners because the eye has a tendency to bring the angles to a right angle. In a Zöllner illusion, the lines appear to us deformed because of small lines which are on the big ones. The oblique lines do not seem parallel though they actually are.

The same goes for the Müller-Lyer illusion. The eye does not pay attention to segments but sees first the angles at their end. It appears that one is larger than the other.

 3) Movement  illusion

It turns! It will make us dizzy. Don’t be afraid, you are not hallucinating, you are suffering from an movement illusion. The human eye gets tired fast when it stares at an object for a long time. If, however, we look next to the object, it avoids staring too intensely and the image strikes other segments of the retina which have their full capacity.

4) Artistic illusions

There are three types of artistic illusions. A group that shows illusion drawings gives rise to visual interpretations that are very different from the properties of the elements shown.

Our brain is used to seeing a real head. But here, the head consists of many animals: an elephant, a kangaroo, a bear... So the brain has trouble analyzing this image.

In the following picture we see a tree and the sea, but aren’t they something else? A baby, no?

Each drawing may result in at least two visual mutually exclusive interpretations. The observer can normally voluntarily move from one interpretation to another, once the different interpretations have been identified and given us some clues about the different interpretations.

This cartoon, created by Willian Hill in 1915, is entitled "My mother / My young woman." The image has two possible interpretations: you see the young woman or the old witch. It is sometimes difficult to switch from one to the other!

Impossible groups: different parts of each of the drawings give rise to conflicting interpretations. All items in this category cannot exist, or it would be highly unlikely that they exist in reality.

The Penrose triangle is an impossible object designed by the mathematician Roger Penrose in the 1950s. By the paradox between logic and reality, which extends to other spheres (cultural impossibility), impossible objects thus give rise to mathematical curiosities and artistic inspirations.

Optical illusions and cultures

"The influence of the culture and  of the environment on our visual perception ", this theory was explored for the first time by Robert Laws, a Scottish missionary, working at Malawi in Africa during the 19th century.

Look at this picture:

What do you see? What is the woman carrying on her head? When researchers put this question to African people, they answered “a box”. Then they asked “where does the scene take place?” This person with a culture with few “corners” naturally said that the family was sitting under a tree. We westerners, accustomed to comfort, see a scene which takes place in a room with a window with a view outside.

Finally, optical illusions show that our vision is always a matter of personal interpretation!

If you enjoyed our article, please send us a comment!

Aurora Borealis. By Matthieu Hollaender & Pierre Caillet

Igor is small. He is a member of an Inuit community. One evening, he was playing by himself not far from the family home. Suddenly he rushed home to talk to his grandfather.

“Grandpa, I think the Gods are sending us a message!”

“What are you saying my little boy? What did you see?”

“I saw a big spot of color spreading in the sky! What was it grandpa?

“Come and sit beside me, next to the fire, I'll tell you the story of this mystery. You are now old enough to understand.”

They huddle together under the caribou skin.

“There are a lot of stories about this extraordinary thing you have seen; each country has its explanation, different from ours, but they are all wrong! Look at our neighbors, they are real poets! They think that a fox wanders through the Arctic snow and lights up the sky thanks to its tail sowing sparks of snow, giving off colors. And the fishermen of the Ice Lakes believe that it is the reflection of herring scales on the water! For the Inuit from the south of Alaska, those of the Yukon River, this special light in the sky simply represents the souls of deer, salmon, seal or beluga dancing. But this light also represents a threat. That is why they hunt it with their knives. To discourage their children from playing outside too late, their parents tell them that this special light will catch them, cut off their heads and play soccer with their heads! Of course it’s not true, don’t worry, it’s a silly superstition!”

“So, what’s the real reason, Grandad?”

“As you know, the sun is guarded by the God Odor and the moon is protected by Elanore. They fight each other because they both want to rule the world. That is why there is a period of darkness followed by a period of light. We have been in darkness for 4 months now. It’s the same every year. It’s because of a trick played by Elanore on Odor. She hides Odor’s light. The colored spots that you saw are stardust from Odor’s torch; he is looking in all the nooks and crannies for his sun. These spots do not last forever in the sky because the sun god is careful not to get caught by Elanore. That is why it changes place quite very often.”

“I am going out to help Odor find his sun, Grandad!”

“Oh, no you're not! You go to bed now. You can help him tomorrow find his sun…”

Igor went to bed, and he dreamt of stars...

A world without light... By Paul Bataille, Justine Lauprêtre & Estelle Larroche

Light is a type of energy which our eyes are able to see. It’s a physical phenomenon, characterized by the radiation of photons which move at 186,000 mph.

A world with no light would be a world where humans could not see. It would happen if the sun disappeared, or if a highly contagious virus made us blind in a short time.

What if we all became blind? How could we live normally?

A blind person is not able to see, so he has to use his other senses to be able to find his way and to have a normal life.

The senses of hearing, smell and touch would become more developed, because they would take over the zones of the brain responsible for vision.

Blind people also develop their ability to feel heat and cold which can help them move around. That is fascinating, isn't it? Without vision, a new universe opens up before us.

Going blind can scare us but if we were born blind (or in a world without light), becoming someone who can see would also scare us so it's just a question of adaption.

As something happens, an image of this event is created in your brain thanks to all your senses. First, listen to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwBCdlFPd2A

You have no problem understanding this is a crowd of rugby supporters. You have made an image of them as you listened.

Now listen to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWS7hxSkd3k

You do not know what it is, so it is very difficult to form a mental image of it.

Now watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qh7kQlg9Vzw

You now have an image in your brain; a blind person however doesn't need a video to make an image in his brain.

What light can teach us about the universe

TED-Ed video: click here!

Lighthouse

> Lighthouse

The humble incandescent light bulb...

When does it date from?

The Lumière brothers invent cinema... By Raphaël Bernard & Antoine DeLaForge

First films projected!

> Les frères Lumière

The Lumière brothers: Auguste (1862-1954) and Louis (1864-1948) were born in Besançon, France. They moved to Lyon in 1870, where both attended La Martiniere, the largest technical school in Lyon. Their father, Claude-Antoine Lumière (1840–1911), ran a photographic firm where both brothers worked for him: Louis as a physicist and Auguste as a manager.

In autumn 1894, Antoine Lumière asked his two sons to take an interest in animated images which Thomas Edison and some other splendid pioneers had already worked on. This paternal incentive is the starting point of an adventure which lead to the invention of the Cinématographe. It was not until their father retired in 1892 that the brothers began to create moving pictures.

Public shows, lasting about 20 minutes, began on December 28^th 1895 in the Indian Room, in the basement of the Grand Café in Paris. L'arrivée d'un train en gare de la Ciotat was one of the main attractions of the show. The locomotive rushing towards the spectators made the film a real success!

To promote the Cinématographe, films had to made. Louis Lumière sent his operators all over the world, thus creating the first documentary films.

The following year, at the World Fair in Paris, the Lumière films were shown on a giant screen.

Helped by his brother, Louis turned to other activities. In 1899, he developed the Photorama. In 1903, Louis created colour plate photography, put on the market in 1907.

He also studied “3-D” photography and presented, in 1920, at the Academy of Science, the photostéréosynthèse process. In 1935, thanks to the anaglyphs technique he achieved cinematographic relief.

The Lumière brothers were curious and inventive, and launched the adventure of moving pictures.

Bending light

Watch the TED talk on galaxy clusters!

What is light?

Watch the TED Ed video!

Optics

What is optics?

Rainbows

What is a rainbow?

> Dispersion

> Grosseteste, medieval scientist, explained the rainbow

Equiluminance

What is equiluminance?

> Optical illusions