Up/Down, a piece by Gorbet Design, located at the Schulich School of Business at York University in Toronto
The Schulich School commissioned Matt and Susan Gorbet to create a piece that would add life and interest to this space in the school's award-winning building. (Seen here before Up/Down was installed) The slanted wall is located across from a staircase that leads down to the basement level. Students and faculty use it daily to reach the student pub and the parking garage.
The architectural function of the slanted wall is to act as a light well, bouncing light from the windows into the lower level. We felt that it was important to preserve that quality, so we chose to set our piece into the wall itself.
Eleven channels of glowing light are inset into the angled wall. The lights are not seen directly, but instead wash over the slanted lip of each channel, giving a feeling of depth and something hidden beneath the surface.
Up/Down adds visual texture to the space and creates a connection between people and the building.
As people travel up and down the staircase opposite the piece...
...a video camera tracks their movements.
People's movements on the staircase create horizontal ripples of white light that flow through the coloured channels.
The ripples wash fluidly up and down, leaving a shimmering echo of presence after people pass.
Schulich has a global focus and offers a highly acclaimed International MBA degree.
The colours in the channels indicate the status of eleven worldwide market indices, relative to the previous day's close. As the markets move, the colours shift along a smooth spectrum from green (up) to red (down), through blue (neutral).
The channels are arranged geographically to represent the location of each market index. (This map is on a plaque next to the piece.)
With a quick glance, passers-by can get a visceral sense for the state of the world markets. The colours are overlaid with the white ripples of movement from the staircase.
Up/Down engages the Schulich community at three levels - it creates visual interest in what was once a static space; it delivers a delightful interactive experience that suggests the individual's impact on the global markets; and it offers an ongoing ambient information source for an internationally focused audience.
