Special Issue "Framing the Virtual: New Technologies and Immersive Exhibitions"

A special issue of Arts (ISSN 2076-0752).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 June 2023 | Viewed by 3457

Special Issue Editors

Professor, Department of the History of Art & Architecture, Faculty in Residence, Clark Honors College, Eugene, OR, USA
Interests: contemporary art and theory; late 20th- and early 21st-century art, theory, and criticism; cultural, social, and aesthetic possibilities of new technologies; screen-based media art and theory; installation art; feminism; digital culture; science and technology studies; digital humanities; contemplative research
History of Art & Architecture, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, USA
Interests: contemporary art and theory; intersections of art and technology; installation art; modern and contemporary Japanese art; history of new media art in Japan; documentation and preservation of new media art; digital humanities; curatorial studies

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Immersive exhibitions have a long history in modern and contemporary art. The metaphor of immersion implies a plunge into an all-encompassing environment, where audiences are seemingly transported into alternate, virtual realities. From panoramas and 3D cinemas to site-specific installations and performances, a wide variety of mediums, practices, and sites have framed immersive experiences in exhibition contexts. Emerging technologies have also played a significant role in this history, as the capabilities of carousel slide projectors, IMAX screens, digital projection mapping, and virtual and augmented reality assist in the transformation of “real” space into “virtual” space.

This Special Issue of Arts considers the role of new technologies in facilitating immersive art exhibitions. How do histories of technology intersect with histories of immersion and the virtual? How do new technologies influence artistic practices such as installation art, performance, or exhibition design? How does technology—broadly defined—impact how audiences experience and interact with exhibition spaces?

“Framing the Virtual: New Technologies and Immersive Exhibitions” welcomes contemporary and historical analyses of immersive technologies and exhibition practices. Potential topics may include: the recent proliferation of immersive, interactive, and experimental art spaces such as Superblue, Artechouse, Meow Wolf, teamLab, and Immersive van Gogh/Klimt/Kahlo; media archaeologies of immersive technology in art; virtual, augmented, and mixed reality in artistic practice; exhibition design intended to envelop audiences in other worlds; and reflections of immersive experience in design, the performing arts, land/environmental art, architecture, and other site-based practices.

Prof. Dr. Kate Mondloch
Dr. Emily Lawhead
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Arts is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • immersive exhibitions
  • art and technology
  • virtual realities
  • histories of immersion
  • exhibition design
  • technologies of attention
  • installation and performance art

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

Article
Becoming (Un)Masked: Semiotics of Identification in Nick Cave’s Hy-Dyve
Arts 2023, 12(2), 53; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts12020053 - 13 Mar 2023
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Abstract
Displayed in a Kansas City neighborhood with a history of blockbusting, Nick Cave’s 14-channel video installation Hy-Dyve confronted viewers with a visceral sense of entrapment in traumatizing spaces of racism. The immersive environment portrayed deeply moving experiences of confinement and concealment, connecting narratives [...] Read more.
Displayed in a Kansas City neighborhood with a history of blockbusting, Nick Cave’s 14-channel video installation Hy-Dyve confronted viewers with a visceral sense of entrapment in traumatizing spaces of racism. The immersive environment portrayed deeply moving experiences of confinement and concealment, connecting narratives of the Middle Passage to present fears of racial profiling. Shown at different scales on the dilapidated walls of a deconsecrated church, the video images enabled visitors to sense what it feels like to be exposed to a scrutinizing and categorizing gaze. Building on Gilles Deleuze’s theory of close-up operations, I explore how Cave both showcases and subverts the visual rhetoric of surveillance, inviting viewers to suspend processes of individuation and embrace alterity. I offer a semiotic analysis of the visual motifs in Hy-Dyve and show how their unstable meanings heighten the potential for immersion in conjunction with the projection mapping technique. The entanglement of video images with crumbling architectural features destabilizes perception and fosters reflection on the imbrication of past and present realities of racial discrimination. Placing Hy-Dyve in the broader context of Cave’s body of work, I suggest that it conjoins two different sides of his practice: a post-black approach to issues of identity which is consonant with his Soundsuits and a more radical activist stance which addresses the particularities of black experience and the burdening history of racial abuse. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Framing the Virtual: New Technologies and Immersive Exhibitions)
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Article
The Influencers: Van Gogh Immersive Experiences and the Attention-Experience Economy
Arts 2022, 11(5), 90; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts11050090 - 20 Sep 2022
Viewed by 2341
Abstract
Van Gogh immersive exhibitions—multi-sited, branded multimedia environments inspired by the artist’s life and paintings—are seemingly ubiquitous in 2022. These itinerant digital spectacles bundle reproductions of Vincent Van Gogh’s most recognizable artistic motifs with tropes of fin-de-siècle madness, bathing their visitors in an artistic [...] Read more.
Van Gogh immersive exhibitions—multi-sited, branded multimedia environments inspired by the artist’s life and paintings—are seemingly ubiquitous in 2022. These itinerant digital spectacles bundle reproductions of Vincent Van Gogh’s most recognizable artistic motifs with tropes of fin-de-siècle madness, bathing their visitors in an artistic wonderland of projected images and soundscapes spread throughout cavernous exhibition venues. The popularity of these commercial juggernauts is unmatched. At present, at least five different companies are staging competing versions of digital Van Gogh art exhibitions in dozens of cities worldwide, with a particular emphasis at present on sites throughout North America. How are we as art critics to make sense of these exhibitions as well as their influence within the institutional context of the visual arts? Taking the digital Van Gogh phenomenon as its central case study, this article investigates the emerging art-themed immersive exhibition model and explores the specific mode of spectatorship it promotes. Situating these projects within the broader framework of the contemporaneous attention and experience economies, and with an eye toward the crucial role of social media, I propose that art-themed immersive exhibitions such as the Van Gogh immersive experiences exemplify habits of digitally-mediated, 24/7 immersive attention and consumption in art and in everyday life. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Framing the Virtual: New Technologies and Immersive Exhibitions)
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