Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Sydney Opera House
From the Sails: Light Years
Sydney, Australia
From the Sails: Light Years was a spectacular celebration of Australia’s iconic Sydney Opera House through light projection mapping and an immersive live-sync soundscape.
Art Processors created an epic 17-minute original film artwork, projected across the “sails” of the western facade of the Opera House traversing its history and legacy as a performance venue, public building and World Heritage-listed masterpiece.
Created for the 50th anniversary of the Sydney Opera House in October 2022, it was a visually joyous celebration of the history and people of this extraordinary performance venue.
The inspiration behind ‘From the Sails: Light Years’ was about using our biggest public space to indicate to the world that the Sydney Opera House is entering its 50th year of work… To work with Art Processors who were able to make that happen and bring in the skills bases that were required was fantastic.
– Fiona Winning, Director, Programming, Sydney Opera House
Telling the Opera House story
Sydney Opera House commissioned Art Processors’ Creative Director, Sam Doust, to create a film and sound experience that captured the history of the building and launched a year-long program of celebrations.
They wanted to tell the story of the Opera House’s creation, the people who brought it to reality and the performances of all forms that have filled its spaces. From the earliest stories of First Nations owners to its ongoing contribution to the Sydney community, the challenge was to capture the spirit of a place central to the Australian cultural identity.
As a recognised subject-matter expert on the history of the Sydney Opera House—not to mention an award-winning motion artist—Sam was uniquely placed to create a spectacular event that translated the wealth of stories into an artwork that spoke to all audiences.
My prior expertise in the many facets of the story was never more useful than beginning to think how best to visualise and represent, in an inclusive manner, the creativity and abundance of this world-renowned performance venue.
– Sam Doust, Creative Director, Art Processors
It was the first time the House told its own story through the popular “lighting of the sails”, but also the first time the projections were accompanied by live synchronised audio that could be accessed by anyone, anywhere, online.
A special place
Bringing an artistic and curatorial lens to the project, we emphasised significant moments of the past 50 years with elements of delight and abstraction that articulated the Australian community’s creative future. We explored the House’s construction and opening in 1973, its legacy as a performing arts venue and the diverse events that have brought the community together for half a century.
We collaborated with artist Jake Duczynski of Studio Gilay to create Wéllema Tubowgule, a celebration of the traditional custodians of the site and its significance as a meeting place. The film’s loop continually returned to this reflection on Country, strongly making the statement “this a special place”. We also collaborated with CG artist Jason Poley and composers Hylton Mowday and Andrew Stevenson of We Love Jam to create an original score for the work.
The film celebrated the people who breathed life into the iconic building. From those committed to making it a reality—Jørn Utzon, Ove Arup and Peter Hall—to the welders, carpenters, engineers and construction workers who built it, the artists on its stages and the many creators backstage.
