海角视频

Hear from John Sloane, Maya Hladi拧ov谩 and Galen Mack-Crane as they share their inspiring work with artist Immanuel Oni and the  M鈥橣inda Kalunga Garden withing New York City鈥檚 Lower East Side through 海角视频鈥檚 Share Our Skills program.

海角视频鈥檚 John Sloane, Senior Lighting Designer, Maya Hladi拧ov谩, Lighting Designer, and Galen Mack-Crane, Senior Electrical Engineer, collaborated with longtime community partners with the 鈥痮n 鈥� illuminating Rivington St. within Sara D. Roosevelt Park, located in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Park鈥痩iaisons, Debra Jefferys-Glass and K Webster, artist 鈥�, executive director of 鈥� 鈥疪yan Gilliam, fabrication partners Stephen Callendar and Brian Cohen, and the New York City Parks Senior Public Art Coordinator Elizabeth Masella were instrumental in bringing the art installation, entitled HALO, to life. 

This project not only honors the past but also fosters a deeper connection to the community and its rich history. We chatted with the project team about engaging with community partners to bring this impactful project to life. They highlight how the project inspired creativity, innovative design solutions, and hands-on volunteer work to make a tangible difference in our local office neighborhood. 

What is HALO?

HALO is a commissioned art installation aimed at illuminating the history of New York City鈥檚 Black community. The Chrystie Street African Burial Ground, granted to the African Society in 1795, served as a burial site for New York鈥檚 Black community until 1853, when most of the estimated 5,000 remains were moved to Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn. In 2006, remains believed to be from this burial ground were discovered during the construction of the new museum. 

Over the past year, our New York lighting design and electrical teams have proudly supported the creation of HALO, led by artist Immanuel Oni. HALO is a public art installation memorializing the now paved over Chrystie Street African Burial Ground. Located at the M’Finda Kalunga Garden in Sara D. Roosevelt Park, the installation is a thoughtful interplay of form and light, enhancing public awareness of the enduring presence of Black communities in the Lower East Side.  

Meet the artist:
 is a first-generation Nigerian-American artist and space doula living between New York City and hometown Houston, TX. He believes design is not about what he is making, but who he is making it for. More on Immanuel Oni .

Share Our Skills program

Before we dive into more about the project, let鈥檚 discuss what enables our teams at 海角视频 to engage in these types of projects: SOS. At 海角视频, our 鈥�Share Our Skills鈥痯rogram鈥� is designed to support community initiatives through engineering expertise and consultancy. Since 2014, 海角视频 has dedicated 200 working days annually to support non-profits and community projects worldwide. Our employees volunteer their time and skills to deliver contextually appropriate solutions, promoting efficiency and sustainability for projects of all budget sizes. 

The Share Our Skills program is not only about leveraging the technical knowledge we can share but is an amazing opportunity for 海角视频鈥檚 designers to learn from our communities about engagement, activism and placemaking. These projects help us to be more empathetic with client needs and better members of our community, outside the office. This initiative fosters a culture of collaborative design processes and inspires engineers of all grades to address critical issues in our communities.  

From recent initiatives like the bustling Chinatown Night Market to the vibrant Soundview Economic Hub in the Bronx, our teams are dedicated to empowering community groups with the skills and tools they need to advocate for, install, and illuminate their public spaces. 

What inspired you to get involved with the Share Our Skills program?

John:鈥� Our lighting team first got involved in with the Chinatown Night Market, which was one of the Neighborhoods Now Initiatives with the Van Alen Institute and Urban Design Forum. Since then, many of our projects have come through connections with friends of friends in various community groups. This involvement has allowed us to foster a tangible, boots-on-the-ground connection to the place we all live. It has helped me get to know and feel a part of a city that can be difficult to feel a part of at times. Hearing the stories and history from long-time residents like Deborah, Bob, and K from the Garden, to name a few, has been enlightening. Learning about the political events and the rich history of the Lower East Side has been fascinating. This deep connection to our local community is one of the main reasons I stay involved.  

Galen: Echoing that point, the city often feels very buttoned-up, with everything built by contractors in an official, top-down manner. It was enlightening and incredibly rewarding to get involved in something we mostly put together with our own hands. While we had some very capable fabrication involvement, being part of a process that created something official and above board, yet very hands-on and volunteer-constructed, was a really cool experience. It was nice to get out there and get our hands dirty a little bit.

Maya: This has been a really special way to get involved in our nearby communities and see a project come to fruition. With SOS projects, it鈥檚 much more immediate and tangible to see the impact of our work, compared to typical projects, and the power it has to influence an environment.  

Could you each share the lessons you’ve learned from this project that could be applied to future 海角视频 projects or any other projects you’re working on?

Galen:鈥疶here is a strong design tradition here. We often look at past projects and the typologies we鈥檝e used before, relying on the same systems. For this project, however, it鈥檚 all about function from start to finish. The goal is to make it work, keep costs low, and ensure it looks good enough to fit perfectly within the designated area. Instead of just reusing fixtures we鈥檝e used before and assuming they鈥檒l look great, we鈥檙e focusing on the details and really drilling into them. 

Maya:鈥疶here is a lot of practical, real-world knowledge that we learned on this project. Observing how things are wired together and seeing challenges come up in the field- like rats getting into the system- highlighted the types of considerations that need to be made for a public installation like this. HALO definitely emphasized the importance of designing for longevity and considering how all the pieces come together in an exterior setting. 

闯辞丑苍:鈥�As designer, this project has helped me refine what design excellence means to a project in the public realm. Learning what is appropriate for a certain project doesn鈥檛 always require the most complex solution to be effective and impactful. That was a significant lesson, and it spans all the projects we do in the public realm and beyond. Focusing on what was truly impactful and important to the community was at the center of the process. 

When it comes to budget, our community activation projects in the public realm constantly challenge us to come up with low budget, high impact solutions. It is amazing what we can create when we learn to adapt common objects and technology for experiential uses.  

Community involvement and impact

How did 海角视频 engage with local communities and what benefits does HALO bring to them?

Maya:鈥疶his project was unique in how locally embedded the team was. Typically, we work with architects, landscape architects, and engineers, but for this project our focus was on directly supporting the artist and working with the fabricator and non-profit organization to create something that would be built within a tight budget and timeframe. It was touching to see how the decades of work from the garden community could materialize in a small way through this project, and how the community coalesced to make it happen.  

海角视频 contributed to the lighting and electrical portions of the project, and we had several larger volunteer days where people helped with tasks like spray painting or attaching elements to the fence. As Galen mentioned, we did get our hands dirty in the garden, crawling around and working together, which makes for a fun and rewarding day. It was inspiring to see so many different people come together to bring this project to life. 

People stop and look at this in a way that we could not have asked for. Because of its size, its scope, and the lighting it makes this place alive.

Debra Jefferys-Glass, Garden Liaison

What was unique about this project?

Galen:鈥疶his project was unlike any we鈥檝e done before. Typically, our projects are very niche, focused, and detail oriented. As an electrical engineer, I鈥檓 usually working on large cables in buildings, but this project involved just one small circuit. There were many more conversations to ensure alignment with nearby contractors, park personnel, and city officials. We had to keep the stakeholders鈥� interests in line, including those managing the building, the people in the park, and the artist, ensuring everything worked in tandem. 

John:鈥疘t鈥檚 different in how closely we鈥檙e connected to the end user. In many of our projects, we are so far removed, contracted through an architect who handles all communication with the client, the community, or whoever. Being part of the process more directly with the community and the people who would be operating it was inspiring and such a valuable learning experience for us. 

Maya: Seeing how important this project was to so many people is not something we usually experience with our other work, especially if it is more remote or larger in scale. This is a project we can walk by any day and see people how interact with it, which is really cool to see. 

The ability to start from scratch and think about solutions without the constraints of past practices is incredibly freeing. Although it can be a lot of work at times, it’s creatively stimulating. It allows us to explore the boundaries of our typical design methods and think of anything, pushing the limits of our ingenuity.

John Sloane, Senior Lighting Designer

As we continue our work with the Share Our Skills program, our commitment to community engagement and impactful design remains steadfast. The collaborative efforts of John, Maya, and Galen highlight our dedication to creating meaningful connections and tangible results. Their experiences emphasize the importance of hands-on involvement and innovative solutions that resonate with the community.

We are proud of the progress we’ve made and excited about future possibilities. The journey with the Share Our Skills program has been both challenging and rewarding, encouraging us to think creatively and act purposefully.