Chrysler Roadshow Takes Art Into The Air

NORFOLK, VA – (April 2013) – The Chrysler Museum of Art will present Airborne, an interactive video projection by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, as part of the Virginia Arts Festival. The evening projections will be on view April 19 to 28 from 8 to 11 p.m. at the Virginia Arts Festival Green on Bank and Charlotte Streets in Norfolk.

The first projection begins immediately following Meet + Greet The Arts, a street party on Granby, organized by the City of Norfolk and the Virginia Arts Festival. It will feature live music, refreshments and the Chrysler Museum Mobile Glass Studio. The event is open from 5 to 8 p.m., and admission is free.

Starting at 8 p.m., the excitement moves to Bank and Charlotte Streets. Airborne will transform a 6,000-square-foot outside wall into a poetic shadow play. Participants are invited to cast their shadows on the wall. These shadows are tracked by sophisticated computer surveillance systems, and billowing clouds of smoke emanate from the shadows. Readable within the smoke shadows are clouds of text from a variety of poetic texts describing the effects of light and shadow. 

Artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer was born in Mexico City in 1967. He currently lives and works in Montreal, Canada. His interactive installations explore the intersection of architecture, electronics, and performance art. He is particularly interested in creating works that depend on public participation. His large-scale interactive installations have been commissioned for events around the world from Mexico City, to Dublin, Rotterdam, Vancouver and New York.

Lozano-Hemmer has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Fundación Telefónica in Buenos Aires, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. He was the first artist to officially represent Mexico at the Venice Biennale.

Airborne was commissioned by the Chrysler Museum of Art in partnership with the Virginia Arts Festival and with the support of the Norfolk Consortium.

The Chrysler Museum of Art is one of America’s most distinguished mid-sized art museums with a world-class collection of more than 30,000 objects, including one of the great glass collections in America, and a new Glass Studio. The Museum campus is located at 245 West Olney Rd., in Norfolk.  The Chrysler Museum is closed during 2013 for a major expansion, but the Museum has organized off-site exhibitions throughout the region. The Chrysler Museum Glass Studio and its two historic houses are open. The Glass Studio, located at 745 Duke St., Norfolk, is open Wednesday to Sunday with free glass demonstrations at noon. The Willoughby-Baylor House, 601 E. Freemason St., and the Moses Myers House, 323 E. Freemason St., Norfolk are open Wednesday through Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. Admission is free at these venues. To learn more about the Chrysler Museum Roadshow exhibitions and regional events, visit chrysler.org or call 757-664-6200.

-30-