LO STORYTELLING DI ADVexpress: MPC - TRANSFORMING OLD MASTERS Sleeping Venus

 
Nel video di oggi del servizio di ADVexpress sullo storytelling nell’audiovisual content, un raro punto di incontro tra l’arte degli Old Masters e new media nell’arte contemporanea.

MPC - TRANSFORMING OLD MASTERS Sleeping Venus
Realizzazione di Moving Picture Company (London)





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Dal 4 ottobre al 2 novembre The Fine Art Society, la più antica galleria privata d’arte a Londra, ospita una mostra dal titolo Transforming, una esposizione di quattro capolavori dei grandi maestri della pittura rivisitati in forma digitale da Rob e Nick Carter, un duo di artisti che sono stati motivati in parte dalla consapevolezza che il tempo medio passato davanti a un quadro in un museo è di solo sei secondi.

Con l’aiuto di MPC (Moving Picture Company), la VFX studio dietro Vita di Pi (Ang Lee, 2013), i coniugi Carter hanno trasformato in ‘time-based’ le opere Sleeping Venus (Giorgione, 1510), Vase of Flowers in a  Window (Ambrosius Bosschaert il Vecchio, 1618), Dead Frog with Flies (Ambrosius Bosschaert il Giovane c.1630) e un dittico di Still Life with Pear and Insects e Still Life with Apple and Insect (Justus Juncker, 1765).

Con ‘Transforming’, Rob and Nick Carter presentano un corpo di lavoro che si innesta con l’arte del passato, sfruttando un new media innovativo per sovvertire la rivoluzione tecnologica e sostituire la tendenza del sovraccarico di immagini senza anima per tornare alla contemplazione di un quadro con uno sguardo sostenuto e profondo.

Il filmato, realizzato da MPC come demo, si concentra sulla Venere dormiente di Giorgione. I Carter trasportano lo spettatore in un paesaggio veneto dove la dea dorme tranquillamente mentre la giornata passa impercettibilmente dall’alba al tramonto, il suo seno visibilmente sale e scende col respiro e la mano o il piede che si contrae durante il suo sonno. La scena è stata resa viva con tecnologia ultra HD/4K, che era ancora in fase di sviluppo all’inizio del progetto quattro anni fa, armonizzando riprese dal vero la modella Ivory Flame con immagini generate digitalmente.


DIALOGUE


Using New Technology (Michael Stanish)

In displaying Sleeping Venus it was really important to us to make sure we had the correct display. We wanted to replicate the original painting in its original splendor. So we decided to go down the 4K route,  which was a huge decision at the time because we hadn’t even done a commercial in 4K, let alone something that was two hours long. 4K technology is basically a huge resolution screen.
So it’s four times  as much as what you’d normally have on an HD monitor.
On top of that, the issue with displaying the piece is that there’s very limited playback with 4K available as well. So there was quite a lot of research that went into trying to find something that worked.


Integrating Live Action (Jeremy Smith)

The unique part of this project for us is the mix between the live action and the CGI. We felt we got so much by actually using a real person that it was worth compromising slightly on the look of the painting in  order to have the real living breathing human being in there. So that’s what led us to the first stage which was to find an actress who really closely matched that painting, and that’s what led us to the model Ivory Flame.
So then what we needed to do was we had to go to a studio and we had to film Ivory Flame against the green screen, and we used a camera called a Red Epic so that we could do a continual one-hour-thirty-minute take. So although Ivory Flame does look a lot like the original painting we realized that we going to have to distort her body because at the time the painting was actually done, girls were portrayed in a completely different way. Then in order to mould her proportions we had take her body into a computer.
And to do this we used a compositing software called Nuke, and that’s how we were able to change her physically.
So specifically we found out that Ivory Flame’s stomach was a lot smaller than the stomach which is in the actual painting.
So that was one of the areas that we concentrated on. And with Nuke when we composited it we were able to increase the size of the stomach. The great thing with working with Rob and Nick is that they’re involved in every aspect of it. It’s a true creative collaboration between us.



Richard Ronan

richard.ronan@hotmail.it