PRISMA MECCANICO 1
PRISMA MECCANICO 2
PRISMA MECCANICO 3
MECHANICAL PRISM (1967)
In the 1960s, Fogliati worked on a series of urban‑scale intervention projects. He sought to endow the city with aesthetic presences by acting even upon atmospheric events through unusual actions. One of these was the coloring of rain. The idea was not to trivialize the concept by using simple colored light beams, but to create unexpected phenomena through a light endowed with “its own particular behavior.” Around the middle of the decade, he succeeded in conceiving and producing a type of light he would name Fantastic Light.
When this light illuminates a stationary object, it appears white; however, if the object is in motion, the light decomposes, revealing the colors that constitute it (since, as is known, white is the sum of all hues in the chromatic spectrum). Fogliati realized that by projecting Fantastic Light onto a moving body, the body itself would become tinged with its colors. This is precisely what he imagined for his Fantastic City: raindrops that, as they fall, carry the colors of the rainbow.
Thus was born the Mechanical Prism, a work consisting of a projector of Fantastic Light directed onto a rapidly rotating vertical disc of white aluminum. The disc captures the Fantastic Light and reflects it, decomposing it into all its colors. In this way, the white disc—the “mechanical prism”—gradually takes on shades of orange, violet, green, and blue, with transitions that are fluid and never abrupt. To the observer, it appears as a suspended sphere traversed by a continuous chromatic sequence, like a small, luminous, multicolored orb. Its rotation also generates a soft breath and a faint whistle, enhancing the sensation of lightness and immateriality.
Equally surprising is the shadow cast by the prism onto the surface behind it, such as a white wall. Contrary to the conventional notion of shadow as the absence of light, an unexpected phenomenon occurs: the shadow itself appears luminous and colored, divided into segments that reproduce the tonalities of the Mechanical Prism. This is the secret of the extraordinary light conceived by Fogliati to challenge perception: Fantastic Light.
Synthetic Light (1965)
During the 1960s, Fogliati worked on the development of his urban projects. He wanted to introduce aesthetic presences into the environment and to act on atmospheric events in unusual ways. One of these was the colouring of rain.
Instead of trivialising the idea with simple beams of coloured light, Fogliati intended to create a truly unusual event with a light that “behaved in a ‘particular’ way”. In the mid-1960s, he designed and produced a type of light he called Luce Sintetica, Synthetic Light, or Luce Fantastica, Fantastic Light.
When the light is used to illuminate a motionless object, the beam appears to be white. When the light illuminates a moving object, then it breaks down into its constituent colours. In other words, the distinctive feature of this type of light is its ability to adapt to the characteristics of the object it illuminates. Fogliati realised that when a beam of Synthetic Light was projected on a moving object, the object would be coloured by the colours of the beam. This is what he wanted to do with rain, and he demonstrated the idea with the Prisma meccanico, the Rivelatore cromocinetico and the Svolazzatore cromocangiante.