Loading Content . . .

ABBA Voyage is a concert experience like no other, a concert that has been almost 40 years in the making. In the purpose-built ABBA Arena in London, the ABBA avatars (ABBAtars) perform five times a week, accompanied by a 10-piece live band. With a setlist of hits and a spectacular light and media show, they thrill over 3.000 visitors per evening.

Our work for Swedish pop superstars ABBA is currently the largest and most complex permanent kinetic lighting installation in the world. It is this lighting that connects the physical with the digital in the all-new ABBA Voyage concert arena. And it plays a key role in this show, which is unlike anything audiences have ever experienced before. “Breathtaking. A triumph,” to quote The Guardian.

Part of the kinetic light installation for ABBA Voyage is a reinterpretation of our large-scale art installation SKALAR. Moving mirrors and light reflections as well as a new type of LED pixel strings are combined to create a huge three-dimensional light display. Almost 700 powered winches of two different types cover an area of 2.500m2 and a volume of 2.5000m3. With 30.000 individually controllable and additionally spatially moving light points, this installation is currently probably the largest and most complex permanent kinetic light installation in the world.

WHITEvoid and KINETIC LIGHTS were responsible for the design and planning of the kinetic show as well as for the complete production of the hardware and programming of the kinetic show part.
The unprecedented size and complexity of the system also required a complete redevelopment of the control software. For this purpose, a new function was integrated into the Kinetics Control Software KLC that allows 30.000 RGB LED light points to be generatively moved and animated freely in space in real time.

Another software innovation is the transfer of the kinetic position data to a 3D software to extend the visualisation into the virtual space of the large-format ABBA Voyage screen. The 3D simulation multiplies the physical kinetic light points to almost infinity. This effect was developed and implemented in close cooperation with the world-famous 3D animation studio ILM (Industrial Light & Magic).

Our special thanks go to ABBA, the director of the show Baillie Walsh and the producers Svana Gisla and Ludvig Andersson, who planned and realised this mammoth kinetic project together with us for almost 3 years.

KINETIC LIGHT products used:
• 430 Winch L
• 430 Pixel Strings
Collaborators: Baillie Walsh (Director) / Svana Gisla (Producer) / Ludvig Andersson (Producer) / WHITEvoid / ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) / Tetro / Green Wall Designs / Wonder Works / Solotech / Unusual Rigging
Technical support: ROBE Lighting
Photos: Ralph Larmann / Johan Persson
Video: ABBA Voyage