Eassy On Light

Topic- To develop a lighting system in a museum setting to meet the aspects of effective display and preservation of exhibits with flexibility in collection from time to time in India.

Introduction

Beyond the purely physical experience of light, lies the ability of it to be used as an expressive medium. Light 's curious nature provides the designer with a powerful medium to engender warmth, safety, wonder, delight and drama. The real and the true meaning comes out only when some amount of correct light is present, else it 's all dark with no vision. In such a scenario when light falls on an artifact/exhibit there are three possibilities. Either the amount of light reflects back completely from the surface of the item displayed and hits the

Therefore the limits of light exposure must be considered in lighting design and early enough in the overall design process. Of the tools available to lighting designers today to satisfy both aesthetic and preservation criteria only a few bring such reliable solutions with little risk of danger, damage or intrusion as fibre optic lighting .

Light levels are measured in two different types of units: lux and footcandles (one footcandle equals approximately 11 lux). Since many years the generally accepted recommendations limited light levels for very sensitive materials is not more than 50 lux and for moderately sensitive materials the range is 150 to 250 lux. Although opinions on these levels vary. In recent years these recommendations have been debated taking into consideration aesthetic concerns and varying rates of light fading for different materials. Also it has been recognized that older viewers need higher light levels to discern details than do younger viewers. Ultraviolet (UV) light causes damage more quickly, and all light sources should be filtered to remove UV. This light is measured in units called microwatts per lumen. In general if a light source emits more than 10 microwatts per lumen, it requires a

But what if the scenario is present with a twist in it. A situation wherein the lighting design has to be coordinated with the change in collection of exhibits. There are museums with permanent exhibits, artifacts, installations, etc. but also do they have a category of temporary exhibits. Once the lighting is set according to the present installation/exhibit and the fixtures are installed keeping in mind the no or least damage policy, the next up in the list is when the exhibit is changed after some time, say days, weeks or months, what should be the plan of action in order to not let it deteriorate which is a possibility with the previous lighting system until and unless it is of the same nature and characteristics, which is a rare situation. Such a situation calls for a flexible lighting system for this bracket of exhibits in order to maintain balance in effective display and preservation, efficiency i.e. costs involved are minimal else changing light fixture with every exhibit each time will cost a lot to the museum management committee and will be a waste of