Celebrating Haydn with an Advanced Multimedia Exhibition

Druckversion

 

By Neil O'Sullivan
 
Visitors to Esterhazy castle in Austria are being treated to a spectacular multimedia display, as part of the Haydn Explosive exhibition. Advanced digital presentations are finely matched with the exhibition’s antique settings, resulting in a striking blend of new worlds and old.
 
The Haydn Explosive exhibition was awarded a Jury distinction at the Austrian State Award for Multimedia & eBusiness in the category of Culture, Entertainment and Games, and in March 2010 was extensively updated, as the new theme ‘Haydn and the opera’ was introduced.
 
Before the updates, the exhibition was already utilising the latest technology to impress its visitors. In the Sala Europa, four high-end projectors were merged to one large-scale ceiling projection, resulting in an almost 60m2 projection in a 90m2 room. The projectors were fitted in cases made of mirrors, which reflected the pattern of the carpet and prevented the equipment from interfering with the room’s aesthetics. Presenting the audience with a seamless projection spanning nearly the entire ceiling was a considerable technical and logistical challenge, exacerbated by the low ceiling height of only four metres.
 
In the walls, 18 monitors, 10 for adults (42”) and 8 at child’s height (19”), have been embedded. These completely borderless flat screens are outlined only by the wallpaper’s margins. The wallpaper’s pattern reappears on the flat screens every 50 seconds, giving the impression that the screen is not there.
 
The exhibition organisers say that the simulation potential of the technology echoes the eighteenth century conception of wallpapers as objects of illusion within a room. The use of screens in this way characterises the designers’ intentions that the media be integrated into the exhibition’s scenography. They explain that they are trying to make use of new technology just as an interior designer from the rococo or neo-classical tradition would have done. Rather than dominate its environment, the media merely support the extensive adornments and iconographic programs.
 
This principle is continued in the quartet room. The musicians of the Hagen Quartet are projected on a finely woven Gaze screen, with the image of a scene in the room of Count Fries shining through. This creates the impression that the musicians are at once part of the setting and also detached at the same time. A neighbouring monitor displays the score’s notes, in time with the music, so that the quartet’s composition can be followed.

 
Because the projection is less than two metres away from the background image, the musicians appear life-sized. The projection’s acute angle also prevents the visitors from being dazzled by the projector’s beam.
 
A central server ensures that all installations are perfectly matched to each other, through synchronisation of the media implementations and operation.
 
During the recent upgrades, a 30-minute loop was developed, allowing for the playback of two arias in the main room whilst playing two different quartets in the quartet room. Two seven-minute animations were created for the ceiling projection, depicting the topics and cultural background of the two operas, closely matched with the musical structure.
 
In addition, two operas were adapted for the playback in the opera room including subtitles in German, English, and Hungarian.
 
A touch option was integrated to the monitor in the quartet room, giving visitors the possibility to switch between the synchronised score and information on the quartet and the compositions being played.
 
The implementation of technology at Haydn Explosive demonstrates how projection and multimedia technologies can be discreetly integrated into more traditional settings, in order to transfer knowledge in new, exciting and creative ways.