RMB City Opera @ The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
Well, I finally had the chance to get over to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art this afternoon to get shots of the new RMB City Opera video exhibit that is currently in the Bloch wing. Here’s a little about the exhibit…
This video—RMB City Opera—highlights RMB City’s virtual cityscape. It includes many emblematic sites such as Tiananmen Square and the Beijing Olympic Stadium. During the video, the viewer enters the city, soaring through and amongst its architectural wonders.
In RMB City Opera a man and a woman interact as actors on a stage and as avatars in the virtual world. Inspired by propaganda operas from the Chinese Cultural Revolution, RMB City Opera includes characters in Red Army uniforms. Batman and Batwoman, Superman and Superwoman are also among the cast.
RMB City Opera is rich in content. It explores the idea of play, romance, identity, utopia/dystopia, communication/isolation, the nature of reality and the global, interconnected world in which we live. This is its American debut.
It’s a fascinating work and I highly recommend checking it out. And thanks to my good friend Tim O’Neill, I had the opportunity to develop a simple “virtual guestbook” for the exhibit that also features an interview between the artist Cao Fei and NAMA curator Leesa Fanning.
With regard to the setup, nothing fancy here, really…just a simple adaption of WordPress. But I think the end result hangs together nicely with the rest of the environment. I have to admit — getting the chance to have my work in the museum in support of the exhibit has been quite a thrill. Not to mention having a great time working with the Nelson-Atkins staff. We’re already in the process of working on more digital features for the upcoming Monet exhibit in April!
