Hello. In the Ruhr region, once the heartland of Germany’s coal & steel industries, light art is installed at many former industrial sites, including at ironworks & steelworks. In this paper I ask, what is the relationship between light art & the steel industry? #SWOS20 1/17

Since deindustrialisation, industrial heritage has played a key role in structural change in the Ruhr. Many light designs were commissioned by the IBA Emscher Park Project which sought to kickstart the economic, cultural & ecological transformation of the Ruhr #SWOS20 2/17

Dubbed the Workshop for the Future of Old Industrial Regions, IBA focused on a land corridor around the polluted Emscher River. 117 projects were initiated, many via a decentralised planning process where city authorities & civic groups made single project proposals #SWOS20 3/17

This planning system led to some civic competition, as some cities wanted what the other had inc. light art. I have studied the IBA archive (Haus der Geschichte des Ruhrgebiets) including the letters & memoranda written by IBA Director Karl Ganser #SWOS20 4/17

The Ruhr is relatively flat, aside from a range of mine heaps. On an evening climb up heap Schurenbachhalde, Ganser reflected on the fact that the heaps were vantage points and landmarks. Lighting, he realised, could connect industrial objects & demarcate the Park #SWOS20 5/17

IBA began to commission international artists to create new landmarks such as the Tetraeder in Bottrop, a 90m steel & concrete structure that can be climbed. The light installation, by Jürgen LIT Fischer, operates on a twilight switch #SWOS20 6/17

IBA’s flagship project is @Landschaftspark created around the Meiderich iron & steelworks. See @t_qwizzle time-lapse of the light show https://bit.ly/2BI5TOL  designed by Jonathan Park. Visible from the Autobahn, it operates like a lighthouse for IBA’s brand & vision #SWOS20 7/17

@Landschaftspark's lighting system can be operated from a laptop. Across sites LED lighting is replacing previous systems (LED is cheaper & more flexible). @Landschaftspark inspired other light designs beyond the Emscher zone. But what do these lights mean? #SWOS20 8/17

They fill in the dark gaps that appeared in cities when steel & ironworks closed & reference the idea of the Ruhr as 'The land of a thousand fires.' The earliest published reference I have found for this name for the Ruhr is 1924 #SWOS20 9/17

There are still working lights. The white flares of chemical plants. When iron is poured at ThyssenKrupp AG in Duisburg https://bit.ly/3i48cwD  the sky turns red & parents tell children that angels are baking biscuits. An industrial aurora #SWOS20 10/17

People have long been drawn to industrial lights. They can form memories of home. I have found photographs dating to the early 20C. In some, what looks like dusk, is air pollution. In 1961 SDP leader Willy Brandt demanded the sky over the Ruhr become blue again #SWOS20 11/17

The lights have been critiqued for obscuring the darker histories of labour conditions & pollution. The Alliance 90/Greens also protested about energy costs in '95. But such criticisms are rare, the lighting of industrial objects is popular in the Ruhr #SWOS20 12/17

Labour /social history is presented through museums, tours, the Internet, books, film, oral history (see https://bit.ly/2YQ6OFW ) etc. Aside from symbolism, the ‘work’ the lighting does is to provide a welcome, wayfinding, orientation, branding & support for the NTE #SWOS20 13/17

Most sites have 24 hr access. Without lighting people wouldn’t go. For many family members of iron & steelworkers, as well as city residents, industrial sites were formally 'forbidden cities', behind walls, gates & security #SWOS20 14/17

Labour is involved: the work of architects, engineers, light designers, technicians, electricians, site managers, planners, civic groups, city authorities & photographers, but this is not highly visible work. Unlike the workers coming out of the gate at shift’s end #SWOS20 15/17

On experience. I was nervous doing nocturnal fieldwork at first. In June sunset was at 10pm & I spent a lot of time on site waiting for darkness. But I quickly began to enjoy night's quietude & differing perspective. I have written on daycentrism in scholarship here #SWOS20 16/17

To end, light design in the Ruhr exemplifies the imaginative reuse of industrial objects in ways that are useful, popular & hold meaning. While lighting doesn't provide historic cues in any fine detail, it does connect to the history of the Ruhr as a steel region #SWOS20 17/17