The Red Room

Artist Steve Hollingsworth writes:

Laura and I were working today on changing a former smoking room at the care centre we’re working in, into a much more useable sensory space. All the walls are glass and it gets a great deal of light, Laura ordered some red gel and we placed this on glass on all the walls. When it’s bright the entire room is bathed in a warm orange/ red glow. We also re-floored the space using tiles in a pseudo Juan Munos fashion. It looks very geometric and bold, hopefully people with reduced vision will be able to perceive the floor as there is a lot of contrast between black and white. We left an aperture so anybody inside can look through to the conservatory space (we have big plans for this space too..) We also bought a big red blind so the space can be entirely red without any other visual distraction. The extreme red-ness of the space really has an effect on vision, on emerging from the space other colours such as blue and green took on a new aspect. We want this space to be spare and clutter free, so people can go in there and just relax or engage in one sensory activity at a time. We also plan to finish off the space by installing some coloured neon to play with the light further, perhaps circles of red green and blue, again re-inforcing notions of being bathed in colour. I guess the space hints toward artists like James Turrell who uses colour and light to show ourselves seeing and how perception is easily fooled.

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