by Henry MacDougall
(click images to enlarge)

THE GLOWING WALL
An Interview With The Designer

The Glowing Wall is a locally iconic light installation on the Denman Street side of King George. In the past couple of years, the installation has fallen into slight disrepair, with some lights appearing burnt out or dimmed. I met up with Jesse Coomes, a former KG counsellor who now volunteers his time running our school Archive Club, and Stefan Zubovic, the wall’s designer, for an interview.

The Glowing wall at king edward secondary school.

I’ve been talking with lots of people around the KG community in the past couple of months about the possibility of fixing the lights. However, the issue with the lights is a lot more complex than it might seem at first glance. Funds to cover these kinds of expenses can be hard to acquire, especially when the building itself will be torn down within the next few years when King George Secondary is rebuilt. The general opinion during our meeting in the archives room seemed to be that it was not very likely the Glowing Wall would be fixed. An idea brought up by Mr. Evans, our school principal, was to remove the installation and replace it with a mural, given the state of the lights.

A mural is a lot more reliable than a light installation. However, in my opinion, I think the Glowing Wall is now an important part of the KG identity, and worth working to get fixed.

Readers can expect more updates in future articles on the restoration, or replacement, of the Glowing Wall in future issues. For now, enjoy this interview with Stephan about the creation of the art piece, which we’re presenting Q&A style:

Editor’s Note - The conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Henry: First of all, what were you inspired by?

Stephan Zubovic [LEFT] and Jesse Coomes at the Glowing Wall’s dedication plaque.

Stephan: Originally, how I got into doing different lights and shows was a water show in Disneyland. So there was this Bellagio fountain style water show called World of Color that opened in 2010, and I happened to just be going to Disneyland that year. So I saw that and I was like, ‘Oh my god, this is really cool.’ It was a light bulb moment literally that clicked and I was like ‘I want to be producing these huge kind of light water laser special effects shows.’ So that was the original spark. And then through my time at King George, I did a few other projects. I'm not sure if you guys still have it, but in Grade 10 we each got to do a personal project. So my personal project at that time was to do a mini-version of that show, kind of a water show in the parking lot basically in this little pond.

And at the time, I had no idea how to do any of this. So I'm basically learning all of the different components of how to do water pumps and lights and all that [online]. Then a year later [after the personal project], I experimented with other kinds of technology doing projection [and] mapping. Back then it was really hard to do this stuff. Now it's super easy. You can find tutorials and software online. But back then not a lot of people were doing it, so we had to hack our way around. So I did that, and I did two years of shows. Then in my last year of high school, I was like, ‘what do I do now?’ I didn't want to do another show, because I didn't want to just go through the same process. So I was like, ‘what could be interesting?’ The first idea was to do something on the facade. I originally thought about doing a projection display that would change throughout the years, but that ended up being prohibitively expensive.

Henry Macdougall (left) and stephan Zubovic in the King George Archives room.

So I settled on lights and, same process as before, I went on the internet and figured out how to do it. That's what started the process.

Later, it was like ‘OK, we have this kind of building materials for these lights and controllers and stuff to make that display run. And then the question is, how do we pay for it?’ The school didn't have any money, and I was 16 or 17 at the time so I couldn't pay for it. That started a hunt to find sponsorships and after about six months we got three really good sponsors in Hollyburn Properties Ltd., The West End Business Improvement Association, and the Burrard Arts Foundation.. [Finally], we pulled the trigger and put it up.

Henry: What was the cost back then, in 2014?

Stephan: I think it was around $10,000.

Henry: What would that be today, do you think?

Stephan: Probably more around 15 to 20k for the same thing, especially with [supply chain issues]

Henry: What was the planning process for the installation?

Stephan: So basically, I started off in Mr. Sinclair's classroom. I did a Photoshop rendering of the school, because I needed to sell the idea to the principal at the time. So I spent a few weeks coming up with the concept and then showed that to the principal, and he said, “that's fantastic, we can do it.” But the cost was prohibitive, so the next phase of that was finding out who actually sells these lights. So I just emailed the company online and they were like, all right, this is how it works and this person sells to this person, this person sells to that. They made it really easy for me back then, 'cause they were surprised that a high school was doing this kind of installation. So they really helped out and produced a list of every component we’d need based on the design that I had to come up with.

Then it was the sponsorship. [There were] nine months or so of just constantly emailing and finding different organizations around the city to get the funding for it. I sent hundreds of emails, and most of them no one replied to. But luckily, you shoot your shot, and someone does reply and [eventually] we got there. They got all of the money for us. We were able to pull the trigger and hire the school board electricians to install it.

Funny story, actually — once we set it all up and it was all turned on, we realized that they sent us the wrong control device for it. So even though they were helping to facilitate the whole project, they had made a mistake and sent the wrong thing. And I was like, ‘oh my god, now it's all these lights, all this stuff, and it doesn't work.’

So that was a cool experience. Looking back on it, having to kind of negotiate with them, like how to fix it and get them to take back the old one and send the new one in. Even when it was all installed, it was still a few months until we got it operational. It's really cool.

Henry: And have you pursued this kind of work further after high school?

Stephan: Yeah, so this basically led into a full time job for me right out of school. I went to university and I studied theatre design. I like to say it's everything about a theatre show outside of the acting or performance — it's the lights, the scenery, the technology, the stage management.

So I studied that. At the time I also started interning at an architectural lighting company locally, so I was getting a school education and a real world education at the same time. So when I graduated university, I jumped into that job full time and stayed with that company for seven years, traveling the world to do projects and displays.

After COVID, I left that company and started doing more entertainment work with another company. Recently, I left that [job] and started my own thing. So now I'm fully independent, doing work in entertainment and architecture.

YEARBOOK DATA BREACH

It was revealed in an email sent out on February 21 to KG parents that Edge Imaging — a service provider that was used to produce KG’s 2022-23 and 2023-24 yearbooks — experienced a data breach. What this means is that student photos may have been “compromised”. The email information did not include who may have accessed these student photos. It is, however, mentioned that no names were associated with the photos that “may” have been “compromised.”

INTERACT CLUB

Recently, Interact Club has been planning to celebrate the World Day for Cultural Diversity (May 21) by making a variety of snacks from different places across the world available to try FOR FREE! This is a fun (and tasty) way to learn more about a new culture while at school.

REPORT CARDS

Semester 2 mid-term report cards were made available on April 26, so if you haven’t already, make sure to check them out on MyEd!

As always, if you require any assistance with MyEd (many parents do, as the website is notoriously difficult to navigate) feel free to reach out to our school’s office for assistance at 604.713.8999.

IN CLOSING

Thanks for reading this May issue of “The Dragon’s Pen”. Check back next month, when I will be discussing a famous KG alumni, and will possibly have an interview with our school’s police liaison officer.