KOERT VERMEULEN: THINKING ABOUT LIGHTING NOT ONLY DOING LIGHTING

　　KOERT VERMEULEN：要設計，更要思考

　　個人簡介Biography

　　Koert Vermeulen, founder, managing partner and principal designer of ACT Lighting Design. With over 20 years of experience in the fields of architecture, entertainment and art installations, Koert Vermeulen, is today a worldwide renowned lighting designer, with major successes.

　　比利時ACT Lighting Design燈光設計公司合伙人、設計總監。Koert Vermeulen在照明行業已有超過20年的經驗，專注于建筑照明、舞臺娛樂燈光和藝術裝置等領域，完成了很多成功的作品，在國際上有很高的知名度。

　　Inspired by the modernity and creativity of his native city, Koert started his career in 1989, when he founded his first professional lighting & sound supply company. After founding ACT lighting design in 1995, Koert started to expand his work to entertainment lighting such as stage plays, urban operas, and then the architectural lighting and art installation, all of which are highly praised.

　　1989年，現代和創新意識開始滲透Koert的家鄉，深受觸動的Koert創立了自己第一家專業燈具與音響公司。1995年成立了自己的燈光設計公司ACT Lighting Design，Koert的路越走越寬。從舞臺和娛樂燈光開始，漸漸把業務范圍擴展至建筑和藝術裝置領域，并且都取得了非常出色的成績。

　　Koert Vermeulen is regularly invited to share his thoughts and expertise, by giving lectures and speeches at conferences. A guest professor from 2004 to 2008 at the prestigious Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, teaching a course on “Lighting Design”, Koert is also a member of the International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) and the Themed Entertainment Association (TEA).

　　工作之余，Koert也常常受邀以講座和會議演講的形式分享他個人的理念和專業知識。Koert曾于2004年-2008年之間擔任比利時安特衛普皇家美術學院的客座教授，講授燈光設計課程。同時，Koert也是國際照明設計師協會和國際主題公園協會的會員。

　　Alighting Design: How did you get into the lighting industry?

　　《阿拉丁·設計》：您是怎樣進入照明行業的?

　　KV: It’s the lighting industry that came into me. At the age of 14, I was already watching with lighting, and I knew early at that age that lighting would be my destiny and made decision to do something with lighting. It’s the time that I even didn’t know anything about lighting design. Lighting is just interesting to me. At that age, I started to buy lighting products for all kinds of small parties, fashion shows and concerts in my hometown. From that on, I went into some bigger concerts and worked as a stagehand for the big starts in America, UK, etc. That’s a big chance and I learned a lot of our industry.

　　KV：應該說，不是我主動走進照明行業，而是它走進我的生命。在我14歲的時候，我已經開始跟燈、跟光打交道。也就是在那個時候，我就已經感覺到這是我的宿命，并下定決心要做出一番成績來，盡管我對燈光設計還一無所知。燈光對我有著很不一般的吸引力。我開始在鄉鎮里舉辦的各個小型聚會、表演秀或者音樂會上奔波，為他們采購燈具。這是一個起步，后來我開始接觸到更大的音樂會，為來自美國、英國等世界各地的明星做舞臺管理。這是一個很重要的際遇，也是我大部分專業知識的來源。

　　Alighting Design: When you started in lighting, was there any designer ever making influence on you?

　　《阿拉丁·設計》：在您入行時，有哪些設計師曾經影響過您?

　　KV: When I was 14, there was no real lighting designer. People who did lighting did not only lighting, he did everything. He might load the truck, set up the lighting, be the consultant, and at the end of the concert, he put everything back to the truck…I really found out that there was real lighting designer when I was about 18 years old, that I understood there were actually people thinking about how to do lighting, and I thought I should be someone like that, thinking about lighting not only doing lighting. The most influential people were all from the theatre and the concert industry, like Michael, Mark…, they are my heroes. Then later when I was about 20, I started to look at the lighting artists, which I think is the other layer to lighting.

　　KV：可以說，當我14歲“入行”的時候，還沒有真正的燈光設計師。那些處理燈光的人并不只是做燈光設計，他可能什么都兼顧。比如，在表演開始前他可能需要將燈具裝車，然后負責安裝燈具，充當顧問，而表演結束后他再將所有東西搬回貨車上……到真正發現燈光設計師的存在的時候，我已經18歲了。我第一次知道有人會切切實實考慮怎樣表現燈光，我立志要成為這樣的人，要用腦袋去思考，而不僅僅是動手去做。對我來說，在職業生涯上影響我最深的都是來自戲劇和音樂會領域的大咖，比如Michael, Mark等等，他們都是我心目中的英雄。而到了20歲左右的年紀，我開始將注意力放在燈光藝術家身上，我想這是燈光設計的另一個層次了。

　　Alighting Design: What fascinates you the most about light?

　　《阿拉丁·設計》：燈光最吸引您的是什么?

　　KV: Lighting is energy, is one of the known energy that can be use in our life. We designers always try to control it. I was finally able to understand a little bit about what we can do maybe about 10 years ago. It still amazed me every day, not only the pure beauty of light, but also about how it influence people, which you can bring into health care or any other field. That’s the energy we actually control and is always possibilities.

　　KV：光是我們生活中已知的可利用能源之一，我們燈光設計師總是嘗試去控制它，而我也只是在大概10年前才了解到其中的一些皮毛。對我來說，燈光每天都是新鮮的。吸引我的不僅僅是它美麗的光線，還有它對人造成的影響，它所能進入的領域(比如醫療衛生)。這是我們所能控制和利用的，光充滿了可能性。

　　Alighting Design: What is your design philosophy?

　　《阿拉丁·設計》：您的設計理念是什么?

　　KV: It really depends on the projects. For architectural lighitng, we put human in the middle, and think about what would human beings feel, see, experience about this kind of lighting. You always expect a good show, so you put the human perspective in the middle. When we do architectural lighting and entertainment lighting, the design philosophy will be slightly different. In architectural projects, it’s very much human-centered, while sometimes in entertainment lighitng design, human-centered design could be pushed aside by the ego and the philosophy is more likely directed by the visual effect.

　　KV：我的設計理念通常取決于項目本身。對于建筑照明，我們會將人擺在重心位置，考慮人的感覺、視覺等多方面的體驗。舞臺燈光也是一樣，要想達到最佳的效果，就必須要把觀眾的視點為主要參考。但建筑照明和舞臺燈光的設計理念又會有所區別：建筑照明非常講究以人為本，而舞臺燈光有時候則會受到自我意識的左右，同時更加傾向于追隨視覺效果。

　　Alighting Design: How is the lighting profession in Belgium? What changed most over the past 20 years about the industry and yourself?

　　《阿拉丁·設計》：在比利時，照明行業的發展如何?過去20年來行業最大的變化是什么?您自己最大的變化又是什么?

　　KV: The independent lighting design profession is not that huge in Belgium, and I think it’s not really important to a single country, I’d like to see it in the whole Europe. In the past 20 years, I think the influence of lighting designers has increased a lot, we are much more appreciated now than 20 years ago. I think only 5% of the buildings are designed with the lighting designer. That means 95% of the buildings are constructed and designed by other people, the architect, the engineer, the manufacturer, etc. Their influence is much bigger. But the changes I’v seen, is that for quality, people are going into the direction of independent lighting designers. If they really want the quality, they will find them. IALD, association of lighting designers, has getting into the European and the American governments, trying to get influence on regulations and laws. It’s the biggest changes that the quality of lighting becomes a big part with responsibility. With the icon, independent lighting designers really should work hard to continue that.

　　KV：獨立照明設計行業在比利時真的太小了，而且我想這對一個國家來說影響并沒有那么大，所以，我們還是以整個歐洲為視角吧。過去20年，我感覺照明設計師的影響力和自身價值都有很大幅度的提升。我想，只有5%的建筑的燈光是找專業設計師設計的，這意味著剩下的95%都是其他非專業人員，如建筑師、工程師、燈具廠商等完成的。但我也看到了一個可喜的變化——對質量的追求讓人們對獨立照明設計師趨之若鶩。一些照明設計協會，像IALD，已經漸漸進入到歐洲和美國的政府系統，試圖在法律法規上得到更多的重視。總之，最大的變化是質量成為了燈光設計中一個重要“義務”。被貼上這個標簽，獨立照明設計師真的應該繼續努力。