Supporting The Leading Lights of the Future:
The 1999 White Light Lighting Bursary
White Light award their 2nd Annual Student Lighting Designer's Bursary at the Annual Lighting Designer's Christmas Luncheon.

Mark Jonathan speaks John Simpson presents the bursaries

Guests at the Annual Lighting Designer's Christmas Luncheon, held at the Royal National Theatre in December, were able to meet three future leading lights in the profession as White Light awarded its annual Lighting Design Bursaries during the event. This year three £1000 bursaries were awarded, to Alex Murphey, Jim Ashley-Down and Karl Wustrau. Established in 1998, the Bursary Competition is open to third year students of the BA Honours Degree in Lighting Design run by Rose Bruford College in London. For this, the award's second year, students had to produce a presentation detailing how they would light a scene from a play, a piece of music, an item of architecture or a live event using a budget of £10,000. From these theoretical lighting proposals a shortlist of six finalists was drawn up, with the selected students invited to generate a full proposal complete with supporting plans and visual material. The students then had to present their 'pitch' to a panel of industry professionals including White Light's Managing Director John Simpson, Lighting Designer and Association of Lighting Designers Chairman Rick Fisher and freelance Production Electrician Martin Chisnall. "We tried to make the presentation process as realistic as possible", comments Project Co-ordinator Jason Larcombe. "Students had to think about aspects of budget, scheduling and crewing as well as the creative elements. We threw in a couple of curved balls for good measure - including a hypothetical production manager halving the budget mid-way through the preparation stage!" Larcombe adds that "the range and quality of work was excellent this year, with each of the students showing excellent presentation skills and a good creative and technical eye. The panel were very impressed by the professional nature of all of the presentations." Subjects chosen by the students included lighting the launch of a new Nokia mobile phone and a millennial architectural scheme for London's Dartford Bridge. Of the three winners, Alex Murphey completed a design for the new Samurai Ride at Chessington World of Adventures, an area of the industry he is particularly interested in. Jim Ashley-Down presented a scheme to light the organ in the Great Hall of Westminster Central Hall, his project showing a strong understanding of the demands of architectural lighting. Finally, Karl Wustrau presented a lighting design for a "Strange Thingys" music concert themed as a space mission! Alex, Jim and Karl were presented with their certificates and cheques by Mark Jonathan, the Head of Lighting at the National Theatre, and ALD Chairman Rick Fisher along with John Simpson of White Light. They then had an invaluable opportunity to start networking with the other industry professionals attending the Lunch! This networking seems to have worked for last year's winners: Chris Clarke is now assisting lighting designer Chris Ellis with a range of architectural and theatrical projects, while Petter Skramstad has joined technical team at the Millennium Dome while also working as a freelance lighting designer. The Rose Bruford Lighting Design Bursary is part of White Light's Training Initiative, its successful education programme. The Training Initiative runs a wide variety of events including the popular White Light Wednesday workshop seasons, and also created the Resource Pack which was a huge hit at the recent Broadway Lighting Master Classes in New York. Details of forthcoming Training Initiative events can be found on the White Light website at www.whitelight.ltd.uk, or by calling White Light on +44 (0) 20 7731 3291. News Page Home Page