This was no ordinary art exhibit with paintings displayed on gallery walls and spectators walking quietly in the gallery space. Created by Grande Experiences, Van Gogh Alive gives visitors the unique opportunity to immerse themselves into Van Gogh’s artistry and truly venture into his world. From start to finish, visitors are surrounded by vibrant colour and music matched to the time period of the art. Van Gogh’s masterpieces come to life, giving visitors the sensation of walking right into his paintings. The paintings are in super-scale and you view artworks from new angles and discover unique perspectives.
Imagine being in a warehouse style building with blackened walls and screens as large as cinemas all around you with multi screens of each painting. Over about 45 minutes the screens change to show the various periods of Van Gogh’s creative life. Some almost appear in animation where the landscape remains static but the clouds move through multiple screens. Photos cannot do it justice but here is a sample.
With my last post I added a new category – Out and About – so I’m going to do some catch up with posts dedicated to places and exhibits close to Brisbane or perhaps within a day of driving. It’s quite amazing what is within reach of our own doorstep and how many don’t know about these places or things to do. We try our best to cover something for Out and About at least once a month.
Towards the end of September I had a catch up with a friend and we chose to meet at the cafe at Mt Cootha Botanical Gardens as it’s roughly half way between our homes. After a good chat and morning tea we took a wander around a portion of the gardens. As you can see from this map the gardens take in a large area covering 56 hectares, however free guided walks are available if you would like to get to know the area.
We walked through the Fernery
then the Tropical Display Dome
and lastly the Japenese Garden (always a favourite of mine)
Yesterday was a morning out at West End, an inner city suburb, to take in the exhibit of the frescos of Michelangelo’s Sistene Chapel. While travel to the Vatican City is not available to us right now, we can certainly take the offerings of this exhibit while it is touring the world.
The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is one of the most famous artworks in the world. This life-size re-creation of each fresco from the Sistine Chapel has been brought to life using highly detailed photos, meaning you can see every detail, brushstroke and colour as you wander through the exhibit. Even if you have seen it in real life, we will see the detail in the paintings up close and not have to crane your neck.
We arrived at the venue a little early and took in one of the smaller galleries on ground level first to see some very colourful art on display.
We had purchased our tickets for 10am which is opening time, so we did not have any overlap with visitors from previous time periods. This allowed me to take some clear photos and for easy reading of the easels explaining each fresco.
An easy explanation of the display is that the paintings on the walls are of the prophets and the sibyls while the paintings on the ceilings depict stories from Genesis, the first Book of Moses in the Old Testament. They begin with tales from the life of Noah, then the story of the first man and woman, Adam and Eve followed by the creation narrative.
In addition at the end of the hall is the painting of the Last Judgment which was created about 25 years after the completion of the ceiling frescoes.
We sat and watched a video presentation about the works and how they were created which was a little light and quirky. Overall we spent about an hour viewing the exhibit and then found a coffee shop for a light lunch trying an Arepa which is a Columbian breakfast toastie. It is made from corn dough and round like an English muffin but flat and filled with mozzarella. Very tasty!!!
If you are interested in seeing the exhibit you have plenty of time. Brought to Brisbane by entertainment discovery platform Fever, the exhibition is taking over The Ice Cream Factory at West Village from 27 October to 5 January, and will be open from Wednesdays to Sundays. Tickets start at $22 for adults and you can book them here.
newhorizons 