CMU School of Drama


Friday, November 10, 2023

Hero is a new immersive exhibition space under Rockefeller Center

www.timeout.com: Although we're ready to move on from the immersive experience trend, there's something about the new space under Rockefeller Center set to officially open tomorrow, Saturday, November 4, that is just worth savoring.

4 comments:

Sam Regardie said...

This new exhibition opening up at Rockefeller Center seems very interesting, but I don’t think the article did an amazing job of explaining what about this immersive experience makes it stand out. I agree with the statement that the article made at the very start - that immersive experiences are becoming a trend - so much so that they don’t seem as unique anymore. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, just something to keep note of. The article tried to claim that this one was different, but then never really went into depth. It seems very similar to other immersive experiences I’ve seen and heard about. Something else notable is that one of the few things this article highlighted was a tunnel of lights that visitors would be able to walk through, saying this would be a great spot for Instagram and TikTok pictures and videos. I don’t love the fact that this is something necessary to mention since I believe people should visit these locations for more than just photo opportunities and should appreciate the art and experience. At the same time, however, this is likely a large portion of the exhibit’s customer base, and I guess that anything that keeps art running is good.

Abigail Lytar said...

Under Rockefeller Center comes a new attraction called “The Liminal”. It is an immersive experience found in the old post office. It takes up 12,000-square-feet of space and is a completely immersive technological extravaganza. Through a series of lights and sounds it has many exhibits each said to be visually striking. After reading up on it a little it sounds like it is a really cool place to visit. As a tech person I love hearing about new ideas or old ideas being used in immersive ways. I wish I would be able to tour this exhibit to truly be able to take in the lights and sounds. The Sonic Sculpture “Gamelatron Bidadari” by Aaron Taylor Kuftner sounds absolutely breathtaking. I hope to see pictures or perhaps a video of it. In addition the article also talked about a corridor of luminosity paired with eclectic sounds that are simply transportive. Making for a great social media post according to the article. In the end I think this is a wonderful idea and wish I could see it.

Hikari said...

This new exhibit, Hero, is super intriguing! I think that for an exhibit to be under Rockefeller Center in Manhatthan covering 12,000 square feet, it has to be outstanding. I unfortunately won't be able to be in New York while the Liminal is running, but I hope to look into videos and other articles on it! I think that having 120 Bose speakers is insane and I can't imagine how outstanding the sound and visual effects would be. Something that I really enjoy about theater is encapsulating the audience into the world that an artist created. With the amount of technology and efforts they are putting into this exhibit, I have no doubt they would succeed in this. An exhibit like this is definitely a huge draw for me in this sense because that is something I strive to accomplish in my art. An immersive experience like this is something I hope to bring to my future audiences.

Sonja Meyers said...

As the article clearly states, immersive experiences are pretty trendy right now, particularly with all of the Vegas sphere shenanigans. And I agree with the article, as I am also ready to move on from talking about the latest new immersive thing. However, this space underneath the Rockefeller Center seems pretty cool. My interpretation of “underneath the Rockefeller Center” is that it is literally underground, but the article doesn’t really explain the details of that outside of mentioning that the space used to be a post office. Personally, I find the transformation of old spaces into a modern environment often to be pretty cool, so I really like that a space that has history but is not currently being used, is utilized to be transformed. I think it’s a lot cooler than constructing a new building specifically to be home to an immersive exhibit, as working within an existing building naturally causes the traits and history of that space to bleed into the exhibitions, which I think can be really cool as a piece of an exhibit.