Southampton’s first hologram exhibition

The first hologram exhibition to be hosted in Southampton launches this month.

‘A Virtual Artist’ by Pearl John from the University of Southampton is on show from 26 August to 26 September in the Special Collections Gallery and the Level 4 Gallery of the University’s Hartley Library.

The exhibition is a collection of personal objects and photographs from a number of Pearl’s family members, ranging from the 19o0’s until the present day. These are overlaid by translucent holograms, containing text and images about the person or object, which recedes back into the object. The depth of the holographic image relates to the age of the object and family member – further back within the hologram represents further back in time.

Pearl, who is Public Engagement Leader for Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southampton, says: “The exhibition is my own ‘special collection’ of objects and holographic artworks, which have been collected to form an archive of my family. The objects hold memories and stories and the holographic images make the invisible visible.”

‘A Virtual Artist’ also includes a selection of Pearl’s own art collection– such as eight lenticular images, which were shown at the Royal Society’s Summer Science Exhibition in July 2012. The data which inspired these animated art works was provided by scientists and astronomers working with lasers, magnetism, astronomy and particle physics at the University of Southampton. Pearl explored different time intervals from ‘pico-second’ laser pulses – produced in trillionths of a second – to black hole events occurring millions of years ago.

Pearl adds: “I hope that the novelty of the non-traditional art form, which has not previously been exhibited in Southampton arts venues, will help attract a new audience to the Gallery from both inside and outside of the University.”

The exhibition will be on show every day from 9am to 9pm in the Level 4 Gallery of the Hartley Library and from 10am to 4pm on weekdays in the Special Collections Gallery. The private view for ‘A Virtual Artist’ is at 5pm on Monday 8 September. To attend, please contact Carol Mapstone at C.Mapstone@soton.ac.uk or on 023 8059 2097.