UK – Twelve Clay Paky Mythos fixtures projected text and images onto the Tower of London in September as part of a star-studded charity event honouring wounded armed forces veterans. Photo: www.thefifthestate.co.uk The initiative was launched to raise awareness of the Haig Housing Trust, which offers housing assistance to ex-service people

USA – Elevation Worship recently recorded its new album, “Here as in Heaven,” in front of a sold-out crowd at Time Warner Cable Arena in Charlotte, North Carolina. Clay Paky lighting fixtures were on hand to support the band’s live recording and DVD shoot. Elevation Worship is a contemporary Christian

Steve Angello – innovative international DJ and music producer – doesn’t believe in doing anything by halves, and so asked his lighting designer Jon Trincas to create something spectacular, full-on and completely unique for his pumping headline set in the Size Matters arena Creamfields 2015, the UK’s premier EDM festival. Photos

By Dave Whitehouse from DWR Distribution A great time was had by all visitors to the The Witness Hilton Arts Festival this year including a new visitor, the MA Lighting Dot 2! With shows ranging from Watershed Live to the Baxter Theatre’s production of Blue/Orange it was always going to

While Oklahoma City is quite out of the way, Stillwater, where the Oklahoma State University campus is situated, is even more so – over an hours drive from city. Oklahoma State is primarily a research university so it doesn’t have a huge reputation for having a theatre department. “The State

Cape Town South Africa based CS Audio, a busy full technical – sound, lighting, video and structures – solutions and rental operation started in 1995 by Donald Clark, became the third company in South Africa to invest in Robe BMFLs, with the purchase of 12 x BMFL Blades together with

UK singer songwriter Charli XCX has publically stated that she experiences sound-to-colour synaesthesia and ‘sees’ music in colours … so it was not a complete surprise to show designer Rob Sinclair and lighting designer Greg Hill when she requested coloured smoke for her current tour. Prominent smoke is also in

The annual Bidvest Awards Gala Dinner corporate function is one of the largest on the SA corporate calendar. The international Bidvest Group, with almost 150 000 employees in countries all over the world, gathers to celebrate excellence and take stock of their performance. An international gathering this prestigious demands a special

Wired Media is a Durban, South Africa based AV rental and production company focussed on bringing the very best production values to a range of corporate events and presentations. The company was founded 10 years ago by Clint Stevenson, who originally concentrated on audio and AV. As it became successful

  Black Coffee is a bustling technical production company based in Durban, South Africa, founded in 2000 by Brandon Bunyan and his wife Jenny. They started in a garage supplying creative staging and lighting to theatre shows, and now have 25 full-time employees and occupy four warehouse / office units

There are three things that Derek Kruger, Workshop Manager at DWR Distribution, is passionate about: Family, the race track and wolves. A new tradition at DWR is to give staff a small gift voucher when they celebrate their birthday. A couple of weeks ago, Derek Kruger made a request. Could

  Gearhouse South Africa has purchased four grandMA dot 2 XL-F consoles which will be split equally between their Johannesburg and Durban branches. “We chose them to fill a gap we felt existed in our inventory of consoles, for desks suited to the smaller and medium sized corporate work,” commented

A theatrical performance of song and dance infused with African emotion and humour, made Elixer the Musical an absolute delight. The show opened in Mamelodi Community Hall on 19th August, to a large audience who experienced musical theatre in their own community hall. The official opening was at the Breytenbach

Photo credit: ToddKaplan NORTH AMERICA – Sublime with Rome has hit the road for a North American summer tour featuring 37 concerts coast to coast. Lighting designer Scott Warner of Karate Pinky Visual Design, LLC, Pittsburgh, has selected Clay Paky Sharpys, Sharpy Washes and A.leda B-EYE K20s for the tour.

London’s iconic Royal Albert Hall (RAH) venue purchased 17 x Robe BMFL Spot moving lights in February which have been used on a myriad of shows and events in the last few months including Space Spectacular, a co-promotion between the RAH and Raymond Gubbay Ltd., featuring the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra

  Established in 2010 by Brian Chigwendere, rental company Puredeal is making waves in the entertainment industry and have taken ownership of a new Avolites Tiger Touch II to keep up with demand. “We started off with an Avolites Titan One,” smiles Brian Chigwendere. He says the company after working at

    CANADA – Toronto-based contemporary dance company, Ballet Creole, marked its 25th anniversary with many events and performances, including their annual spring season at Harbourfront Centre’s Fleck Dance Theatre. A.C.T Lighting, Inc., the exclusive distributor of Clay Paky fixtures in North America, helped lighting designer Brad Trenaman obtain a

  GERMANY – The Airbeat-One festival happens yearly since 2002 on the private airfield of Neustadt-Glewe in North Germany and is held by the rental company Music-Eggert. There are several floor where a lot of EDM fans can listen to several styles of their favourite music. The Main Floor this

UK – The spectacular Electric Daisy Carnival landed in England this year with its trademark colourful performers and EDM stars with lighting controlled by a host of Avolites consoles on two main stages. This year marked the third EDC in the UK and was again held at the Milton Keynes

Edinburgh, Scotland – One of the latest additions to the Philips Strand Lighting line of consoles, the NEO, has made its Edinburgh Festival Fringe debut, taking up residence for the duration of the arts festival in popular venue C south. Operated by leading Fringe independent venue producer C venues, C south

  Robe BMFL Spots and Blades were an integral element of the lighting scheme designed by Pierre Marleau of Orange Frog Productions Inc. for the Grandstand concert stage at the 2015 Calgary Exhibition & Stampede, arguably the world’s most famous rodeo, exhibition and festival held annually in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Hilton College: 17 – 20 September 2015 KZN’s premier arts festival:  the 23nd annual Hilton Arts Festival will be hosted in the picturesque Hilton College from the 17 – 20 September, 2015.  “The focus is on freshening the face of the Festival and beginning to secure another excellent programme, all

Showgroup used 4 Robe BMFLS for Rocking the Koppies, an intimate event hosted on a farm in Potchefstroom. Control was on an Avolites Tiger Touch II. “This was a private function for a fiftieth birthday party and included performances by Prime Circle, Just Jinjer and Mean Mr Mustard,” said Andries

Moscow, Russia – Lighting designer Roman Stolyarov has used a wide range of Clay Paky fixtures to create stunning lighting looks in celebration of global cosmetic company Oriflame’s annual awards ceremony and banquet, which saw over 3000 employees attend. Leading technical production house MAX’N’MAX created the concept for the event

  Prolyte truss showed off at  the DWR Distribution stand at Mediatech 2015. Mediatech is the largest media and entertainment technology trade show in southern Africa, hosted every two years at the Ticketpro Dome in Northgate during July. DWR are the Prolyte distributors in South Africa. “I had a vision to

  There’s no greater ‘goosebump moment’ for any LD than audible gasps of amazement from a crowd reacting to a lighting or visual effect … that’s what happened each night in the Joburg Theatre, downtown Johannesburg as a truly spectacular ‘rose window’ – made up of 89 x Robe LED

Blood Brothers, South Africa’s first ever supergroup, is a project featuring 10 of the country’s best known musicians and rock heroes, who recently played a special one-off concert to a hugely enthusiastic 3500 capacity audience at Johannesburg’s Carnival City Big Top venue. Lighting – almost entirely Robe, a mix of

For many Land Rover enthusiasts, it was difficult to swallow the lump in their throat as they sat around the camp fire with Kingsley Holgate, a humanitarian and modern day explorer at the Landy Festival South Africa 2015, held on the 22 and 23 August at Soetdoring Vakansieplaas in Vereeniging.

With the International Indian Film Academy Awards (also known as the IIFA Awards) the International Indian Film Academy honours both the artistic and technical excellence of professionals involved in Bollywood. Started in 2000, the ceremony is staged in different countries worldwide every year, with the most recent one being held

  UK – Clay Paky Mythos, Sharpy, Alpha Spot HPE 300 and Sharpy Wash 330 fixtures are performing crucial lighting roles during season two filming of music show Sky Arts Sessions, allowing Sky TV lighting designer Richard Bowles to create fresh and dynamic looks for the varying acts in each

The rich and vibrant Latin music scene generates a lot of ‘crossover’ between artists and the production side of the industry in the Mexican rental world. Most people involved in companies started their industry careers playing in bands and many are still active musicians or are involved in artist management.

South African lighting designer Peter Rieck is the proud owner of one of MA Lighting’s new dot2 XL-F consoles. Peter, an industry professional for 15 years and one of the country’s leading television lighting specialists recently launched a new company, Rieck’s, headed by himself. Having been an MA user for

  Robe’s news team met the Larssons at a special 10th anniversary edition of Let’s Dance in Sweden, where they were busy in Magazin (warehouse) 7 at the Frihamnen container port and ferry terminal in Stockholm, a frenetic site specific location that has provided a gritty and visceral juxtaposition to

Italy – Mario Biondi is one of the few Italian artists who can claim some sort of esteem and saleability outside Italy, perhaps on account of the characteristics of his kind of music, or perhaps because he sings in English. Before taking on a huge number of concerts in major

Italy – Renzo Arbore sits on the chair in front of Fabio Fazio as it is announced that he will be the special guest in the final show of Che Fuori tempo che fa (Fazio’s talk show). The transmission will be devoted to Quelli della notte, one of the most

  UK – For over 30 years AC/DC fans have demanded high octane, big bang punch from their live experience and this year the band’s Rock or Bust tour did not disappoint. Set designer Ray Winkler joined forces with lighting designer and show director Patrick Woodroffe to seamlessly translate the distinct

DWR Distribution teamed up with DimBright for an LED installation for Cube Communications Limited in Rwanda. Johnny Scholtz from DWR advised the client on a cost effective way to light up the set of their new News Studio. Jakes Mogale from DimBright was then commissioned to carry out the installation.

The main stage for the 2015 Innibos arts festival – one of the largest Afrikaans events in South Africa drawing over 107,000 people over five days – staged at Hoërskool Bergvlam in Nelspruit, was lit for the eighth year by Pretoria, based LD Johan Ferriera. This year he chose to

No fewer than 26 community theatre groups will strut their stuff at this year’s HELLO Community Theatre Arts Festival. The Festival was launched last year by TUT’s Department of Entertainment Technology, in partnership with the City of Tshwane and DWR Distribution, to expand the boundaries of theatre by interacting with

Johannesburg, South Africa – Philips’ entertainment lighting brands Vari-Lite and Strand Lighting, along with the Showline product range, have enjoyed three jam-packed and successful days at a buzzing Mediatech Africa show in Johannesburg.  Joining valued partner and leading lighting supplier for South Africa DWR Distribution on stand, Philips exhibited the award-winning new

Singapore marked the country’s 50th Anniversary – SG50 – with huge pride, as flamboyant celebrations erupted all across the island, culminating in a special National Day Parade (NDP) in the Padang, right in the heart of the city. The NDP show was attended by the Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong

  Italian superstar Vasco Rossi completed his Live Kom 15 stadium tour in a blaze of glory with a production designed by the combined talents of set company Gioforma and long term lighting designer Giovanni Pinna, which also incorporated substantial video elements with screen content managed and controlled via grandMA2

Arguably one of the greatest rock bands of all time – with their instantly recognisable hard driving guitar power chords, screeching acerbic lyrics about life on the edge and renowned for some of the most awesome hi-energy live performances in the history of the genre … rock gods AC/DC are

Los Angeles based Felix Lighting invested in 60 of Robe’s BMFL moving lights – 48 BMFL Spots and 12 BMFL Blades – for their busy rental stock. The fixtures were immediately deployed on the kineticFIELD main stage at the 2015 Electric Daisy Carnival (EDC) in Las Vegas, and at the

Robe was delighted to help launch Yaron Abulafia’s exciting new book “The Art of Light on Stage: Lighting in Contemporary Theatre” at the 2015 Prague Quadrennial. Robe is sponsoring this work by the artist and award winning lighting designer. Photos by Louise Stickland. The launch – attended by over 300

The Hollard Insurance Group, South Africa’s largest privately owned insurance group, has invested in low consumption Anolis LED lighting to enhance the exterior signage at the Hollard Campus, a landmark property situated in Parktown, Johannesburg. HKLM were the Brand Agency of the upgrade and commissioned DWR Distribution to install eight