C4's spotlight on Damien Hirst opens virtual exhibition doors

21 March 2012

Channel 4 has announced the launch of a cutting-edge virtual tour of Damien Hirst's first-ever retrospective in the UK - to be unveiled two days before the landmark show at Tate Modern opens to the public. 

In a groundbreaking arrangement with Tate Modern, Channel 4 Arts will make a 360˚ online video tour of the exhibition available on channel4.com/hirst for one week from 2nd April.

Using pioneering technology, it is the first time a broadcaster has provided interactive access to an art exhibition in advance of its opening. Available for one week only, internet users from across Britain will be able to take a private, interactive tour around highlights of the exhibition at Tate Modern. Comedian and fellow artistic maverick, Noel Fielding, will act as an online guide, taking the audience on a private tour through the exhibition. Along the way, users can watch video inserts of Hirst himself providing background and insight at key artworks.

Channel 4 Arts Commissioning Editor, Tabitha Jackson, said: "I am delighted that Channel 4's vital partnership with Tate and our long association with the YBA's from Steve McQueen to Sam Taylor Wood, and now Damien Hirst, has given us this opportunity.  By experimenting with innovative new technology as well as traditional forms of television, we can help audiences experience the exhibition in a new, personal way before doors are even open."

The online experience uses innovative yellowBird technology which allows web users to move around the exhibition using their mouse or touch pad to view 360˚ video footage in all directions.  The interactive video tour can be paused at any point, while the user explores 360° stills of the exhibition space.  The stills will carry hotspots that will trigger additional video content for a number of key artworks.

"We're thrilled be working with Damien Hirst, Tate and yellowBird on this project," said Kate Quilton, Multiplatform Commissioning Editor, Factual at Channel 4.  "It does exactly what we look to do - use multiple platforms to deliver stories in ways which fundamentally change the audience experience and increase the impact of the idea. To allow viewers to preview the exhibition for themselves straight after the programme, before the doors even open, is really exciting for us," she added.

The online interactive private view will be unveiled on the evening of 2nd April - the same night that Channel 4 will screen two documentaries about Hirst as part of a major multimedia spotlight on the artist.

In The Damien Hirst Show (w/t; 8pm), the artist himself  will take surrealist comedian and fellow artistic maverick, Noel Fielding, on an exclusive walk through his new show at Tate Modern, providing a behind-the-scenes look at this landmark exhibition and a body of work spanning more than two decades.  Along the way, they'll chat about Hirst's career highs and lows, which, together with high profile interviews and archive footage, will give unprecedented access to the artist and his art.  

Damien Hirst: Thoughts, Work, Life at midnight on 2nd is an intimate and revealing portrait by BAFTA award-winner Chris King (Senna).  As well as a series of candid interviews with Hirst, the film includes never-before-seen footage, largely collated from the artist's own archives.  The film was made to run alongside Hirst's retrospective at Tate Modern and will be available on Channel 4 and 4oD.

Produced by Jude Tyrrell who joined Hirst in 1997 when he set up his company Science Ltd, Damien Hirst: Thoughts, Work, Life shows a private side of the artist rarely seen by the public.

 

The Damien Hirst Show (w/t), 2nd April, 8pm on Channel 4
channel4.com/hirst -live at 8.45pm on Channel 4
Damien Hirst, Thoughts, Work, Life, 2nd April at a quarter past midnight (ie, 12:15am on 3rd April) on Channel 4

Times and titles of programmes are subject to change

The Damien Hirst exhibition will be at Tate Modern from 4th April to 9th September
http://www.tate.org.uk/