Neushoorn is a new entertainment venue, in the heart of Leeuwarden, The Netherlands, a multi-functional locale in the north of the country that opened in October with Elation LED lighting rigs in several of its performance spaces.
Housing two rooms with stages along with a café, exercise and cultural production areas, and rooms for workshops, Neushoorn can host a wide range of events – dance and club nights, rock and pop concerts, and theatre and dance performances. It also serves as a school for developing talent. Its two main stages, the 350-capacity Arena and the venues largest live performance space, The Big Room, feature all-LED Elation lighting rigs, as does a small performance space in the café.
Environmentally friendly with firepower
The Neushoorn lighting set-up was designed from a concept created by Klaas Visser, head of audio, video and lighting at the venue. He explains: “The concept was to create a fixture combination that was rider-friendly and had the potential to create new and old style lightshows using LED lighting only. There were two LD’s who supported us in making the decision on which fixtures were best for us. Elation was the only brand that had the fixtures we needed at a good price.”
Lighting supply and installation of the Neushoorn lighting system was undertaken by Elation partner Lightco, the lighting sales division of the Ampco Flashlight Group. The relationship began, said Klaas, at an older venue where Lightco was part of a shoot-out with other vendors. “Elation had what we needed across the board,” he said. “The competitors did have a few good fixtures but were not close to the quality or quantity we required.”
The Neushoorn lighting package includes several varieties of Elation LED lights – PARs, striplights, blinders, moving heads, ellipsoidal spots, and more. “It was important that the lighting be all LED,” Klaas stated. “The local authorities wanted an environmentally friendly venue yet still get a lot of firepower from the lights, so LEDs were the only option.” Both the Arena and The Big Room stages feature more than 90% Elation fixtures while the café, where performances also take place, has a complete Elation lighting set-up consisting of SixPar 200 LED PAR lights.
The Big Room
The venue’s first big concert was held on 21 October in The Big Room, a 750-capacity space that is outfitted with all LED lighting, including the ACL set-up. “It was very hard to find an LED replacement for ACL looks but the Elation ACL PAR 200 does the job,” Klaas commented. “It is a very nice ACL replacement with RGBW and has a nice beam that is strong enough to emulate an ACL.”
Other fixtures in The Big Room include SixPar 300 LED PAR lights, Colour 5 Profile ellipsoidal spots, Platinum Wash ZFX Pro and Platinum Wash ZFX Pro XL moving heads, warm-white Lumina Matrix panels, Cuepix Blinder WW2 white light blinders, and Protron 3K LED strobes. Horizontal and vertical lighting set-ups can be rigged on The Big Room balcony while the back balcony area provides for easy access to backlights and pulling of backdrops.
The Arena
The Arena is a multifunctional room with surrounding balcony and a stage that can be placed at different locations for customisable set-ups. Complimenting some older fixtures in the room are SixPar 200s, 6-colour LED PARs that include a UV LED that Klaas says is “excellent for club nights.” The Arena also has Platinum Spot LED Pro moving heads, which Klass called “simple but very effective little beam lights,” as well as Cuepix Strip Tri’s which is “also suitable as a blinder.” White-light ELED Fresnel 150 lights work from the front of the room. The lighting fixtures in the Arena can be rigged from several locations on and under the balcony, as well as from four trusses on rolling chain hoists.
As a new cultural home for pop and youth culture, Neushoorn is thriving with its multi-functional theme, impressive variety of acts and not least its state-of-the-art LED lighting system. “We made the right decisions and the installation has been a success,” Klaas concluded. “By only using one brand we’ve been able to realise real benefits in service, ease of use and last but not least, on price.”
