Light Revealing Experiences

            When people think about lighting, although we are aware of the importance of natural light, we often , although we may subconsciously think about natural light – in this case, the sun – our first active thought goes to artificial lighting.  According to the article Light Revealing Experience, humans experienced many types of light.  Over the course of our lives, we will experience natural lighting such as daylight, moonlight, starlight, and firelight.  Millet’s main ideas including light and place, light and nature, light and climate, light and time, and light and task are a good basis for how we perceive light and how all types of lighting affect us.

            Millet’s first topic of light and place establishes light is natural – that it comes from the sun.  From this article I learned the effect of light in a location is based not only on sunlight but on nature and its surroundings.  The biggest reason     for this      effect is the material, whether it is solid, translucent, or anywhere in between.  After reading the article I felt I had not experienced, while growing up, the effect light has on a natural environment, such as by a lake throughout the seasons.  Growing up in New York City, I was not surrounding by nature much.  There were plants in my mom’s house and there were trees dotted along the street.  Every summer we could go to Flushing Meadows Park, which was a more open and smaller version of Central Park.  I have never considered how light interacted with brick buildings or if light was even a factor when these buildings were built.  I believe light had a stronger role to play when building skyscrapers, but I do not know more than that.  Another topic discussed in the article was the effect of light depends heavily on the cultures, which are both affected by location.  Although, I continue to think and compare my experience with light growing up, I cannot help but wonder about the architecture of the city and how its culture influences our interaction with natural light.  

            In addition to light and place, light and nature is discussed in Light Revealing Experience.  My understanding from the article is that although we want to be protected from harsh weather we do not want to be disconnected from the outside.  One way that continually connects us to nature is to manipulate light so that it is symbolically represented – to tie the outside with the in by connecting them so there is a seamless border between the two.  One example includes the representation of a forest.  This is done through grilles that symbolize tree trunks, colored shutters which filter light and symbolize leaves, but also cast a green hue.  Another example is representation of a starry sky through the stringing of fairy lights to a ceiling.  An additional example is creating the illusion of water from a mountain stream through a stone screen like in Hagia Sofia and water in general by daylight filtering through colored glass based on a glazed pattern and coloration.

            Light and climate, although similar to the previous topics further discusses light in a different manner. The main focus is that because climate affects people, their habits, and their rituals we need to keep in mind that there are many ways to overcome harsh weather.  The importance is to overcome but still be able to celebrate and use light to our advantage without completely shunning it.  In the discussion about light and time, it seems that there is again a subconscious awareness.  It also seems this awareness that at one point might have been more consciously apparent, has become ignored.  The other day I took my dog out on a walk after class and I made a conscious effort to look at the sky – to take notice of what the sunset looked like during this time of the day and season.  I am not an expert I was able to notice the difference between a sunset in the middle of summer, with its oranges and reds, and a sunset that is near the end of summer, which looked cooler in pale blues and purples. 

            The last topic discussed in this article was light and task.  My impression before reading was that light and task was solely focused on artificial lighting – this is not the case.  It is the opposite of what I would normally think of regarding light and task.  Instead of it being about artificial lighting it is about combining natural light with artificial light for the best result needed for a specific task, such as reading in a library.  The library needs light to allow people to comfortably enjoy reading.  This resulted aspiration for a shadow less environment where a person can choose any spot in the library to read without discomfort.

The most interesting thing about my experience with natural light is that I did not have the opportunity to truly experience moonlight until I was in another country.  I learned a lot of things throughout this article.  The biggest thing was that the climate and the culture of a location affect our interaction with natural light, as well as natural light affects the climate which in turn affects the culture. In the end, light is manipulated to satisfy and bring comfort to people.