As the owner and principal of technology design firm OneButton, Matt Emmi constantly strives to understand what truly matters to his clients. “I find that people don’t really want speakers, they want music,” he says. “They don’t want a lighting control system, they want to turn off all the lights in their home with one button. We prefer to take a classic approach to modern technology."
It’s that nuanced insight into client desires that has helped Emmi and his team become trusted design partners among perhaps the most visually discerning audience imaginable: the art world. From illuminating works produced by renowned artists like Dustin Yellin and Theo Pinto, to helping gallery owners and enthusiasts bring greater depth and dimension to their collections, Emmi has a unique perspective on the interplay between art and light—and how to optimize the power of each. We sat down with Matt to talk about his process, and learn how he and his team use Ketra to illuminate art in entirely new ways.
To start off, can you share a bit about your background and approach to lighting?
I’ve been in the Technology Design business for 20 years. I started with designing home theaters, which led to other projects in those homes such as distributed audio, lighting control and shades. My firm, OneButton, does residential and hospitality projects mainly, but also some really unique projects, like our collaboration with artist Dustin Yellin. As far as approach, we find that the more responsibility we can have over a project from the start, the more we can ensure a positive, creative result. Ultimately our aim is to marry the client’s desires, the architect’s vision, and our performance objectives. Ketra helps us make that happen. It’s given us new domain over lighting—we're the ones designing the system, programming it for the client, and maintaining it.
What was it like introducing Ketra to Dustin? Can you walk me through the design process?
Because Ketra is such a new medium, the quality and type of light you can generate from the system is unknown to most people. It's not reasonable to engage with the customer and say “What do you want to do?” They simply can’t fathom what is enabled by the technology. We find it’s easier to give clients something to react to. We do the base programming, set fundamental lighting scenes, and then create together from there— and we followed that same process with Dustin.
Previously, the Psychogeographies were displayed under theatrical projection lights—around 3400K—that registered too warm. With Ketra, we started with a scene at a more color accurate 4700K. We then explored how Vibrancy interplayed with the color palette of the Psychogeographies to provide a more vibrant, yet accurate color. From there, we played with angles of light, distance of the light from the pieces, and further tuned the color of the light specific to the segment of each piece. Having experienced the fundamentals, Dustin especially enjoyed playing with colored light to tint the pieces, using the color almost as a paintbrush to highlight different sections. Ketra enabled Dustin to see his art in a totally new light and it was really cool to see him rediscovering older pieces.
Because of all the fine detail, it’s been said that Dustin’s pieces are a unique experience from 10 feet away, five feet away, and one foot away. Did you take that into consideration when lighting them?
Yes, we had specific focus on that one-foot experience. With the existing lighting, you could only see the first couple of layers of glass. But with Ketra, the light penetrates deeper, expanding the field of view and allowing viewers to appreciate depths that were previously shrouded. Our goal is to captivate the viewer with the intricacies of the pieces. Up close, you can see the motifs and clever imagery—you get the deeper messages Dustin is conveying. You also really get a greater sense of how much work goes into these creations.