042
Yorgo Lykouria
Rainlight
With the next FX Talks
event being planned for
2020, we spoke to the
creative director at
Rainlight Studio and
asked which radical
thinkers have provided
the greatest inspiration
RADICAL
THINKING
FX TA L KSCan you pinpoint the thought that led you to
a career in design?
When I saw Star Wars as a child – experiencing
the cinema transformed into a world like
nothing we had ever seen before – it wakened
the belief in a future that is up to us to create.
It could be anything we want it to be. I also
came to acknowledge that ‘the Force’ is a real
creative principle!In terms of the design and architecture
industry, what do you consider the most
radical era or pivotal moment?
Th e Gothic cathedrals were built to elevate the
human experience; an immersive all-at-once
experience, never seen before and, in a way,
not seen since. Th ere was a shift in thinking
about architecture which gave priority to the
human experience. By expressing the
structural forces as trajectories of stone
articulated ribs, rising from the ground to thetip of the vaults, one feels the forces as lines of
energy. Th is required structural feats that went
beyond the limits of what was considered
possible; a real act of faith. Th en going so far
as to remove the structural clutter from the
inside by placing the fl ying buttresses on the
outside, they inverted the experience of
architecture. Th e backstage was on the outside,
the real show inside. Th e idea of expressing
structure became a modernist principle. Th e
Centre Pompidou is a Gothic building.Which radical thinkers have been
an inspiration to you in your career?
Th e jazz legend, Miles Davis. While everyone
was trying to play faster and more furiously, he
went the other way, looking for the soul of the
song between the notes, in the space between.
He showed the way for a motif to be minimal
and still be fi lled with emotion. I learned more
about architecture and design from Miles than
from anyone else.Who else from outside the industry can
architects and designers learn from?
Christopher Nolan. He is the most
architectonic, or one could say symphonic, of
fi lm-makers. He thinks like an architect within
the advantage of a fl uid medium. His story
structures are built in the way architecture
should be, as an unravelling of experience.
Imagine being lost inside one of his labyrinths!
When you managed to fi nd your way out, you
would probably be back at the beginning, but
not be sure. Or was it a dream?Who are the radical thinkers in design who
inspire you now?
Luigi Colani. He defi es trends and follows his
inner compass.What will lead the way for more radical
thinking in your fi eld?
Technology is driving us away from the real
essence of our experiences in life. While we
look to technology as the marker of progress
and innovation, it is the ways in which we
humanise our times that will make things
radical. Experience is subjective and internal.
Despite what is all around you, it’s what goes
on inside that makes it ‘real.’ Finding a way to
create humanised engagement within the
state of our etherealised world is the crux of
the matter.