oEIkZD

color and shadow have played an important part, and in
which the study of chromatics, perspective, pigment, texture,
technique and materials have been intimately connected.
Light plays an interesting role in the work of Lozano-Hemmer,
a role that is expressed in many facets of his
work, including this exhibition at the MUAC. These facets
emerge in projects and exhibitions such as Pulse Corniche
with its xenon light ray display in Abu Dhabi; Method Random
with its chromogenic prints that make use of “random
number” generators, interweaving the pseudo-random (a
machine is incapable of generating random numbers) and
its artistic perception; Performance Review, in which the
artist links together thousands of fingerprints and digital
surveillance systems; or First Surface, in which he plays
with motorized mirrors, silhouettes, lights and shadows.
In a similar way, in the exhibition at the Venice Biennale,
Some Things Happen More Often Than All of the Time, he
incorporates the lights and (cardiac) rhythms of spectators,
who thereby take an active role in the exhibition. Thus, in
his work creativity and innovation are brought together
within an artistic conception.
Meanwhile, this new exhibition is presented at the
MUAC as part of the activities of the International Year of
Light and Light-based Technologies (IYL 2015), an initiative
adopted by the United Nations (at the 68 th General Assembly
in December 2013). Within the framework of the IYL 2015,
this year features activities covering a wide range of themes,
aimed at informing and attracting interest to light and lightbased
technologies and how they impact upon societies’
challenges in the fields of energy, agriculture, health, communication,
technological innovations and everyday life.
Light plays a central role in a wide range of research
areas and technological developments. In the IYL 2015,
these are presented in numerous combinations and intersections
such as: light and nature, light and life, light and society,
light and technologies, light and communications, light
and health, light and the Universe, and light and art, that, in
turn, cover a variety of disciplines and themes.
Light is central to the processes of photosynthesis and
circadian rhythms, and it regulates many of the activities
and characteristics of living things. For example, the distance
unit in the Universe is the lightyear and the information held
in light allows us to estimate movements, accelerations, and
the chemical composition of stars and galaxies.
The year 2015 marks various anniversaries of discoveries,
scientific advances, and technological innovations
related to light. For more than a millennium, efforts to understand
light and its applications have built our knowledge of its
nature, thus leading to numerous findings and developments.
Among them are Ibn al-Haytham’s Book of Optics, or Kitab
al-Manazir, in seven volumes; the discovery of the moons of
Jupiter by Galileo Galilei; studies on the nature of eclipses
and the solar system by Copernicus and Kepler; Isaac Newton’s
measurement of the distances between the Earth, the
Moon and the Sun and his corpuscular theory of light; James
C. Maxwell’s experiments in the spectral decomposition of
light and fluorescence, his research on the wavelike nature
of light, the phenomenon of interference, electromagnetism
and his electromagnetic theory and the dual nature of light,
the photoelectric effect, the speed of light and special relativity
theorized by Albert Einstein.
Efforts to understand our surroundings in the solar
system, the Sun, stars, galaxies, stellar clusters, supernovae,
pulsars, black holes and the dimensions of the Universe,
have used light, within the broad spectrum of radiations,
matter, and dark energy. Many unknown factors remain,
even regarding the basic aspects of light—for example, its
dual nature as wave and particle—, and these continue to be
researched and exploited, as in the development of photonics.
Within this development there are also innovations
and new technologies: lenses, telescopes, microscopes, the
camera obscura, photography, cinema, telecommunications,
laser surgery, fiber optics, magneto-optics, diodes, chromatographs,
and sincrotrons or particle accelerators. In
recent times we have seen the invention and development of
lasers, including their applications in medicine and communication
technologies, to measure distances, among other
things. Today, the distance between the Earth and the Moon
can be measured with a laser that allows us to quantify the
speed with which our satellite is moving away.
In light of the above, the IYL 2015 international program
covers the areas of science, innovation and technological
development, health, life, energy, culture, and art.
It includes international as well as national organizations,
172 JAIME URRUTIA FUCUGAUCHI
LIGHT–SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND ART 173