The life and work of Vincent van Gogh is the subject of a brand new multi-sensory outdoor exhibition opening in Wellington tonight.
Thousands of his paintings, including "The Starry Night", "Cafe Terrace at Night", and "Almond Blossoms" will be projected onto an enclosed complex of towering shipping crates.
Set to a background of surround-sound music and with a view of Wellington's own starry-night, the exhibit is being heralded as unlike anything New Zealand has seen before.
The exhibit is the joint enterprise of Wellington NZ - the events arm of the city council - and Melbourne-based Grande Exhibitions.
"They wanted to do something different for their business model," said Warrick Dent, Wellington NZ's events and experiences manager.
"For us, we were looking to be able to do it whether we were at Level 1, or if we went to a Level 2 situation, we'd still be able to hold the event."
Fifty-two shipping crates are being used, set up in various formations with 21 projectors illuminating van Gogh's work, at Odlin's Plaza.
A combination of multi-channel motion graphics and cinema quality surround sound are being used to bring the paintings to life.
While the event has been already staged in other countries, it has never been done outside before.
"It's quite grand, I guess," said Elliott Harris, a member of the production team.
"It's something I haven't worked on, a projection event of this scale, and obviously being outdoors adds quite a lot of additional challenges but also it will add quite a nice framework, when it gets nice and dark, and clear night, it will be quite a beautiful thing."
Photo: RNZ / Dom Thomas
To get the exhibition up and running, 70 people from different parts of the art sector have been employed. Fellow production team member Bridget Carpenter said it was a huge boost following a tough few months.
"I'm just really happy to be at work," she said, "and to have something to build and work on. I think that's generally the vibe.
"For so many people their work in the arts is their community as well, and it's great just to be reconnected with those people and putting on something that they're really passionate about, is really awesome."
For the people who got to be at the advance screening, the night before it happened, it was a feeling of amazement, and the joy of being able to experience art is such a capacity.
"Everything goes so well together," said Te Auaha art student, Sophie Morton. "Being able to see the paintings on such a large scale, with the drama of the music, brings them to life completely."
"It was really interesting to see how everything was layered together," said fellow student Willow Thomassen. "Seeing the paintings move, it works with the way that his paintings are made.
"They're made with movement and colour and vibrancy, and that was really brought together here."
While van Gogh's most ardent fans might be hoping for a real-life starry sky to match, the open-air exhibition will be running nightly whatever the conditions ... stopping the show only if winds reach 100 kilometres per hour.
The exhibition closes at the end of October.
