Project: Bass
A Vibrant Symphony, Part II
The British artist and filmmaker Steve McQueen installed “Bass” at Schaulager Basel. The piece has since been adapted to complement Schaulager’s own architectural character, flooding the space with a 40-minute, immersive presentation of low-frequency tones and spears of shifting hues.
Steve McQueen’s installation uses a custom designed LED strip containing the Visiolite Vibrance™ LED chip in combination with high precision RGBW to achieve 8 channel color mixing. The LEDs are coupled with a custom controller using 16-bit precision, expanding the color gamut to include every wavelength of the custom LED spectrum.
The world-renowned artist and Academy Award-winning filmmaker returned to Schaulager in June 2025, with his most abstract work to date and 12 years after the groundbreaking exhibition. Specifically attuned to the architecture of Schaulager, Bass is largely inspired by McQueen’s keen interest in the effect of light, colour and sound on our physical environment.
