The Cleveland Museum of Art
Collection Online as of December 13, 2025
Unit #167, from the Clavilux Home Instrument (First Home Lumia Instrument) Series
1930
(American, born Denmark, 1889–1968)
Overall: 85 x 55.8 x 39.6 cm (33 7/16 x 21 15/16 x 15 9/16 in.)
Gift of the Artist 2000.129
Location: Not on view
Did You Know?
A curator of education bought this object in 1954 with the intention of making it a gift of the artist, but apparently the museum was perplexed over its status as a work of art, and did not formally add it into the collection until 2000.Description
Thomas Wilfred was a pioneer in using light as a primary artistic medium, and he coined the term lumia to describe his new art form. This early example is a cabinet with an interior mechanism incorporating a lightbulb, motor, hand-painted glass disc, and reflective surfaces, all of which operate in unison to project abstract images in motion and color against a screen. The viewer can turn exterior knobs to manipulate these projected compositions. The artist named this device a Clavilux, after a Latin word meaning “light played by key.”- 1930–2000Collection of the artist, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art2000–The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
- Orgeman, Keely, Thomas Wilfred, James Turrell, and Maibritt Borgen. Lumia: Thomas Wilfred and the Art of Light. New Haven, CT : Yale University Press, 2017. Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 102–103, Plate 2
- Lumia: Thomas Wilfred and the Art of Light. Yale University Art Gallery (organizer) (February 17-July 23, 2017); Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC (October 6, 2017-January 7, 2018).Illuminations: The Art of Light. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 22-November 29, 1987).
- {{cite web|title=Unit #167, from the Clavilux Home Instrument (First Home Lumia Instrument) Series|url=false|author=Thomas Wilfred|year=1930|access-date=13 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}
Source URL:
https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2000.129