PROJECTOR EXPERT CASE STUDY SERIES
Micah Stansell and the
Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia
Optoma’s TH1060P Brings Art to Life in Atlanta
Micah Stansell and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia
Atlanta, GA
Exhibition Needs
With his exhibition title “The Water and the Blood”, artist Micah Stansell wanted to fill a room with bright and compelling floor-to-ceiling images that would capture the imagination of visitors to the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia.
Expert Solution
Optoma’s TH1060P projector brought together the ideal combination of brightness and contrast ratio, along with high-definition resolution, to immediately draw museum visitors into the audio-visual experience created by Stansell.
Results
For 14 weeks, art enthusiasts flocked to the Museum of Contemporary Art and were immersed in the amazing
images delivered by the
Optoma TH1060P.
“We needed to have a level of picture quality to entrance the viewer and make it a vivid viewing experience,”
As part of a grant opportunity, artist Micah Stansell wanted to fill the walls of an exhibit space in the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia with colorful, high-impact images. Titled “The Water and the Blood”, the exhibition shared the artist’s family history and stories through a Southern storytelling style that combines images, narrative and music.
“I am interested in theoretical things and the ideas of memory and the ways that seeing and remembering convolute, conflate and mesh,” said Stansell, who won a grant to do the installation as part of the Working Artist Project.
The exhibition, which ran from mid-September to December 3, 2011, depended upon high-definition projection technology to draw in and capture the imagination of gallery visitors. “We needed to have a level of picture quality to entrance the viewer and make it a vivid viewing experience,” said Christopher Escobar, head of Escobar Pictures, who assisted Stansell on the production and installation of the piece. “We decided that the TH1060P would bring them as close as possible to having pure images, as they would in their dreams.”
Bringing Art Alive
The exhibit space is comprised of eight screens on three walls. Twenty-seven minutes of movie footage run continuously and simultaneously on each wall. In addition to listening to music played in the space, visitors receive headphones that allow them to choose between two synchronized sound tracks—one of the characters in the images speaking and the other of a narrator. Often, viewers stay and watch the full loop several times, seeing and hearing a different experience during the progression of their visit.
“It’s a multi-screen experience, like watching a movie on eight screens at once,” said Stansell. “As you enter the gallery, you are surrounded by images and you can’t see it all at once, so you have to physically turn to see it all. You become the editor as you select which parts of the image you view—and each time you go through the room, you end up with a different feel of the story.”
High-Definition Experience
Optoma’s TH1060P DLP projector was a key tool for delivering the images in a way that would be enthralling and immersive for gallery visitors. “It’s a great time to be an artist, since we’re always working on a budget, which is the nature of the beast, and want great images,” said Stansell. “HD projectors are more powerful, more compact, smaller and cheaper, so we’re finally hitting a point of affordability and accessibility for this technology.”
The artist developed a list of must-haves that included projecting an
image size appropriate to the space, high-definition projection (HD) capabilities, and more. “We didn’t want the technology to be noticeable in any way,” said Stansell. “I wanted there to be a perfectly seamless band of images, all matched in
height, as people walked in, so they would be immersed in the pictures.”
Eventually, he decided on Optoma’s TH1060P, which provides HD 1920x1080 resolution, 4,500 ANSI lumens brightness, 2500:1 contrast ratio and the ability to project images of up to 300 inches. “The TH1060P delivers fantastic image quality and the projector is perfect for the space,” said Stansell. “The projectors deliver exactly the right balance of brightness for the space.”
The artist also depends on the Crestron RoomView resource management software. Which is supported by the TH1060P and provides status and vital statistics on all of the projectors from a single management console. “The software allows me to set up a schedule for the projectors so that I don’t have to rely on the museum staff to facilitate the projectors.”
Creating Reality
The Optoma TH1060P, with its bright, high-contrast images, has become one artist’s medium of choice to deliver his message and story. As visitors flock to the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia, “The Water and Blood” let’s users enter Stansell’s story, delivered in wall-sized images, in a whole new way.
“The TH1060P delivers fantastic image quality and the projector is perfect for the space.”
— Micah Stansell, artist
