London is set to welcome a new venue, Lightroom, which is billed as a ‘new home for spectacular artist-led shows’.
Lightroom is located in King’s Cross on Lewis Cubitt Square and has been designed by Haworth Tompkins as a sister space to the Bridge Theatre.
The new London venue is a joint venture between design and production company, 59 Productions, and London Theatre Company.
It has been backed by a senior group of investors led by Sir Leonard Blavatnik who is represented by Danny Cohen, president of Access Entertainment and Michael Sherwood, former co-chief executive of Goldman Sachs International. Lightroom’s chief executive is Richard Slaney, formerly of 59 Productions, and its executive chair will be Nick Starr, co-founder with Nicholas Hynter of London Theatre Company.
Lightroom is located in a four-storey-high space and is equipped with the latest digital projection and audio technology. It is set to open on January 25.
Booking for its first show, David Hockney: Bigger and Closer, is now open for the initial period between January 25 and April 23. The artist will use the new venue to take the audience on a journey through his art, featuring iconic paintings alongside rarely seen pieces and newly created work.
Tickets start at £25 ($30/€29) for adults and from £15 for students.
The show is the result of a three-year collaboration between Hockney and the creators of Lightroom, and will be the first original show for the venue.
Show director Mark Grimmer of 59 Productions said: “We have worked with David to bring together large-scale projected images, animation, archival and bespoke interviews and a commissioned score to create a new kind of show which owes as much to Hockney’s theatrical design as to his painting, drawing and photography. It’s been thrilling to work with David over the last three years and we hope the show will introduce a whole new audience to his art.”
Hynter added: “What’s so exciting about this show is how authentically Hockney it is. Listening to his voice in this astonishing new space while seeing his artworks unfurl around the four walls is going to be both an experience and an education. It suggests how potent this medium will be for the other creators and artists with whom we will make new and original Lightroom shows in the years to come.”
Access Entertainment’s Cohen said: “Lightroom is a new home for the world’s great artistic innovators. It’s an opportunity for them to think and create in new and spatially ambitious ways using the latest digital technology. David Hockney’s new show will delight and amaze audiences – we can’t wait to open the doors to Lightroom in January 2023.”
Lightroom chief executive Slaney added: “We’re inviting the world’s leading creative minds to collaborate with us to use Lightroom’s epic scale, cutting-edge projection and revolutionary sound technology to create something completely new.”