Contemporary Performance Lighting is a coming of age story for the field of lighting design. On the shoulders of a century of technical and artistic progress, a collection of international designers and thinkers usher in a new era for our discipline – one in which meaning finally becomes the central pursuit. Seasoned practitioners and new designers alike will find inspiration in these terrific explorations.

Deanna Fitzgerald, Lighting Designer and Vice Dean, University of Arizona, USA

Light – that immaterial material with the power to dematerialize – performs as an agential force in our daily lives. But within the shadowy realms of theatres, galleries, 'found' spaces and nocturnal outdoor sites, it is employed as a transformational aesthetic medium by artists of technical alchemy attentive to the subtleties and intensities of its 'appearing'.

This timely anthology critically celebrates light as a performative medium and an event in itself. Meditating on processes, practices and projects its contributors confront the politics of perception and constructions of visuality to challenge conventional hierarchies and assumptions not only in the world of theatre but within the world as theatre. Chapters explore its relevance to the performing, visual and spatial arts - including architecture and urban design - to reveal how lighting design integrates effects and affects to orchestrate, enliven and shape our individual and communal experiences.

Dorita Hannah, Designer and Independent Academic, New Zealand