PHOTO : MANUS HOPKINS PHOTO : COURTESY OF RED EYE MEDIA one simply hasn ’ t been created yet , adding that the audio world is a few years ahead of the video world right now when it comes to digitalization , something that is constantly opening new possibilities and sparking innovation in the realm of sound production .
“ It ’ s become kind of industry standard ; you don ’ t need to run miles and miles of copper when you ’ re doing constant touring anymore , you just run ethernet cables everywhere and you can run your audio through that ,” Richards says . “ And so , that ’ s becoming more mature in the audio industry , especially at the professional level .” Richards does see video taking a similar route , which he thinks will make art installations like this more common , and with fewer technical challenges that can prevent art shows from
reaching the level of this one .
“ I think the vanguard for video is still being developed , and we ’ re kind of at the cutting edge of it , because we have so many [ projectors ],” he says . “ Because we have such a large deployment of a large number of them , I think that , as you can imagine , the amount of data that needs to move down the pipeline between the audio world and the video world is quite different .”
Richards says lots of his work on the show was done remotely , and admits that these days , he spends most of his workdays in Zoom calls . Having to work remotely brought more challenges to the creation of this installation , but he found himself impressed at the systems his colleagues designed to make remote work possible .
“ Frida was installed by remote camera ,” he says . “ We have these high-quality camera kits that we set up , and the only technical support we need locally is someone to plug it into our network and to put it on a mount and roll it into the right location in the room .”
All the software , content transfers , and verification on the walls was able to be done remotely . Richards said it was interesting and fun to watch this unfold , and he is proud of his team for designing the tools necessary to pull it off .
The creative and technical teams must work synchronously to make the show run smoothly , and Guidotti says there were times in the process his team had to get creative to overcome the production and technical limits without sacrificing their vision . Something that he found helped was the creative freedom he and his team were granted with this project , meaning they were able to work around the limits rather than scaling down the production to fit within them .
“ We wanted to get more creative with the paintings . So , we disassembled them , or we assembled them in different scenarios or contexts , or we mix them , or sometimes we don ’ t ,” he says . “ The important thing is that we take our freedom to create something that is art on its own . It ’ s not just displaying someone else ’ s art , but it ’ s our show about Frida Kahlo , there is our creative vision inside , and that ’ s very important to us .”
While Guidotti has worked on very complex projects in the past , he didn ’ t want to overcomplicate this one with over-the-top animation , instead opting to let the art speak for itself , as he ’ s found , ultimately , it ’ s the art that elicits an audience reaction .
“ It doesn ’ t matter how complicated the animation is or how technical you get , the important thing is that you don ’ t lose the focus on getting the audience engaged and inspired all the time ,” he says .
The way to ensure the audience will react to something , Guidotti says , is to create an emotional link . All the show ’ s visual and audio components work together to elevate Kahlo ’ s art and present it in a way the audience likely couldn ’ t have imagined it .
“ This show is a journey ,” he says . “ And we bring you along that journey .”
The creative process of each component , or scene , of the show , starts , like anything , with the planning . The team first pick out the artwork that will be displayed and decide how it will be animated , and essentially make up a script for the segment , before moving on to putting together the graphics .
“ We know that for that scene , we ’ re going to have , for instance , these 10 Frida Kahlo paintings and these two pictures , and we know what we want to do with that ,” he explains . “ If the scene is complicated , or there ’ s something technical that
28 | Summer 2022