Immersion Into Art
My visit to the Van Gogh exhibit was thrilling.
I've experienced fantastic performances in the past, and some may have equaled this one, but none has surpassed it. It's odd to think of this experience as a performance. When we think of performance, we automatically think of people. However, this is a light show, larger-than-life images of Vincent Van Gogh's paintings at the South Street Seaport, NYC.
Have you ever dreamed of stepping into a painting?
In the performance space, there are three rooms. We sat in the largest one, about the size of half a football field, empty except for folding chairs placed here and there in groups of two or three, depending upon the party's size. There were no rows or aisles. Some people sat on the concrete floor; some even lay on it.
I was with three other people, one of whom we lost immediately, as it was very dark when we entered. It was scary. It was so dark that I couldn't see my feet or the floor, and I imagined tripping on an object or a person. My friend took my hand to guide me. I was grateful.
We asked one of the multiple attendants about getting chairs, and she said she would bring them. And soon, we were seated, awaiting the start of the performance.
The ceiling was at least 20 feet above us, and the walls were flat on all four sides of the room, going directly upward. We sat about 30 feet from the long wall of the rectangular space in the middle.
You could feel the excitement in the air as we awaited the start.
Almost imperceptibly, it started. Not tiny images but gigantic ones emerged on all the screens. They flowed from one wall to the next until the entire wall space on all four walls, and the floor was illuminated with the gorgeous color, brush strokes, and figures Van Gogh had painted.
There were, at times, different images on each wall moving like a parade of enlarged details of his masterful work, nothing like paintings confined into frames. We looked at enlarged close-ups of elements of these masterworks allowing us to study details that we may have missed in previous viewings.
Imagine yourself surrounded by giant sunflowers or irises that flow across the walls and the floor. We watched the artistic creation of his bed in Arles, first outlined in white, then black, and finally into the colors we are familiar with, as the intimate image continued its path across our field of vision.
This show used 500,000 cubic feet of projections, 60,600 frames of video, and 90,000,000 pixels. The technology was mind-boggling.
The immersive concept was originated and directed by Massimiliano Siccardi in Paris, a new way of looking at art and a new way of looking at film. The first presentation took place in Naples within the San Giovanni Maggiore church.
Throughout the display of these gorgeous images, we listened to original music written by Luca Longobardi and his HRC Variation (upon Handel's Sarabande KWV 437.) Handel Sarabande's pulsating, poignant tones underscored the despair of Van Gogh's life and deeply touched me. The music was magical and added to my immersion by supplying glorious complex sounds.
At times, the images flowed upward or downward, giving me the impression that the floor was rising and lowering as projections changed direction. I felt myself moving upward when the images went down and vice-versa. I had to remind myself that although I felt the movement, it was an illusion.
I was overwhelmed by its beauty and other-worldly music and had tear-filled eyes.
At times, familiar images and colors morphed into different color arrays giving them a new look. It was fascinating.
During the COVID lockdown, I completed a1000 piece jigsaw puzzle of Van Gogh's Starry Nights. To complete the puzzle, I had to study the brushstroke represented on each tiny piece, making sure I understood its rhythm and direction before carefully fitting it into the picture. That gave me an intimate understanding of Van Gogh's composition. Then, seeing the enlarged stars traveling across the room all around me, I was presented with another glorious aspect of these beautiful stars viewing them as if I was standing in a field looking up at them in person. Total immersion!