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Toynbee Studios launch event

Anne Bean

an evening display of lights cascading from the Toynbee Studios building
© Hugo Glendinning
2007

A site-specific commission to celebrate the re-opening of Toynbee Studios on 1st March 2007. Anne used the imagery of cutting ribbon and the opening and bubbling up of champagne to create an installation that became a celebratory event.

The installation swathed the building in white ribbons and bubbles and the event was built around a music piece composed and orchestrated by Ansuman Biswas and performed by the Shree Muktajeevan bagpipe band dressed in full Scottish regalia. The pipers, picked out by spotlight and coils of ropelight, were positioned all around the site from balconies within the Toynbee campus to neighbouring flats, offices and tower block.

The event was composed to include various pyrotechnic sounds and visual effects as the building was unveiled by the explosion of the ribbons opening up to reveal the building. A huge finale of lance work spelt out the words TO BE which transformed into TOYNBEE.

an evening display of lights cascading from the Toynbee Studios building
© Hugo Glendinning
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