Purists will scoff, but we could be nearing a future where new technologies make art museums come to life. Not hyperbolically, in the sense that virtual reality displays and touchscreen tablets let you interact with art in new ways (we’re already seeing that in spades, thanks to smart renovations at places like the Cleveland Museum of Art and the new Cooper Hewitt.)
This is more literal. In this near-future, works of art might actually register facial expressions. They might blink, or look right at you.
This installation from Arnaud Pottier, of BK Digital Art Company, teases what that might look like. Pottier, who lives and works in Villeurbanne, France, used projection mapping technology to cast new details onto the face of a plaster bust of Apollo (in Greek mythology, Apollo is the god of many things, including the sun, light, knowledge, and art, making him a poetic choice for an experimental installation involving light projections). A making-of video shows how Pottier's team rigged a light box underneath the bust to make Apollo’s face shadowy, and ominous. A video custom made to fit the dimensions of the sculpture’s face gives life to its eyes---formerly blank white plastic orbs---so they can blink, flicker, and cast a gaze about the room.
Tech-wise, GOLEM x APOLLO isn’t wildly different from other face mapping projections, like the ones from Japanese producer and director Nobumichi Asai, that turn his subjects into leopards and robots. But the results here are far subtler, and because the installation hinges on an inanimate object, it could more easily be applied to exhibits at museums. Imagine GOLEM x APOLLO brought to scale, in the sculpture wings at the Louvre, or the Met: entire corridors of classical marble statues flickering in motion all at once, like a Greek chorus brought to life.
