BELGIUM – Lighting designer Jan Van Lindt from PRSPKTIV DESIGN has been working with one of the most hotly tipped young artists of the moment – hugely charismatic Belgian-Egyptian singer songwriter Tamino. Fresh from winning a 2019 MIA (Belgium’s top music awards) for Best Alternative Artist, the effortlessly handsome and passionate young performer has been gaining critical acclaim as fast as fans on the cusp of his career and his first album Amir which dropped at the end of 2018.
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Jan recently lit three high-profile sold-out showcase evenings at the Ancienne Belgique in Brussels where he used five Robe MegaPointes on the floor behind the artists as the main dramatic lighting tools.
He chose the versatile MegaPointe – sourced from the venue’s 24 new house fixtures – to accent the intensity and drama of Tamino’s performance. “It’s all about the music with him and my job as LD is to support with interesting visuals that don’t distract from what he’s singing”.
The AB show was the culmination of a series of one-off’s for which Jan specified a floor specials package delivered by dEvents, including the five MegaPointes, a crunched fabric drape upstage, some moving LED battens and LED wash / strobes, together with a grid of vintage filament bulbs which were hung just in front of the backdrop.
Jan also works as part of the famous AB venue’s lighting crew as well as doing his own freelance designs, and they all really pushed to get the new MegaPointes delivered in time for the gig by Robe’s Benelux distributor, Controllux.
Luckily everything aligned and he was able to have his MegaPointes for this design for which he was assisted by Maarten Dever.
Jan has been using Robe products for some time and chose MegaPointes as primary lighting fixtures for the power, flexibility and the sheer dynamics you can get from them when running in both beam and spot modes. He particularly likes the quality of the light and its flat field which ensures that when in spot mode, there’s no hot spot, a feature particularly useful for crisp, precise gobo work.
He thinks the output from the 470W lamp is “incredible” compared to the small size of the fixture and still impressive when zoomed out and in colors. The unit weighs just 22kg so it’s handle-able.
“The prisms are great used in combination to produce the craziest results” he commented, adding that “MegaPointes are in a class of their own when it comes to creating some of these effects”.
Although the Tamino show wasn’t driven by effects, Jan was able to weave some skillfully into a very theatrical-style show replete with intricacies and subtlety.
The artist takes an interest and offers his opinion about certain lighting aspects, which is great as a starting point, but he also respects Jan’s expertise, skills and imagination.
“It’s very exciting to be working with a new artist” Jan states, “especially one with a long, successful and interesting career ahead. “He’s great fun to work with and always open to new ideas for stage presentation”.
For the AB show Jan really enjoyed integrating the MegaPointes and the Robe Spiiders in the house ‘top’ lighting rig into the show and his touring package. “They were a great match as you would expect”.
Tamino continues playing more shows in Europe in the coming months and will be playing festivals over the summer… with a massive show planned for the Lotto Arena, Antwerp in November.
Photos: Ramy Mohavam Fouad
