Aperture Lamp

When I first made The Triaparator I had to make a prototype of the final aperture design so I could be sure it would work before I committed to making three of them.

Well, that prototype worked so well that I did not need to change anything.

For three years the prototype has been kicking around my studio. I often used it to demonstrate how the kinetics of the apertures works.

Now that prototype has come into its own as a stand alone work.

I’ve made it into a lamp.

While building this I’ve imagined it’s an old theater lamp.

The lighting element is a really bright LED located behind the disc in the center of the aperture blades. The copper hemisphere warms, defuses and reflects the light wonderfully and you can narrow the beam or dim the light by closing the aperture itself.

The lamp rotates and pivots and is held in place by an old brass detent pin.

By the way, the aperture is not used or reclaimed but originally designed and fabricated by Almost Scientific.