Exploration of some of Gauguin's artworks by the Museum Wearable adapted from the digital artistic reproductions (DAR) conceived by the artist Etienne Trouvers

Concepteur du Wearable Museum : Flavia Sparacino.

Auteurs des scénarii : Etienne Trouvers, Laurence Tardy.

Montage et réalisation : Nicolas Binet (6ruecourat) et Jérôme Leclercq (Caméra buissonière).

Artisan tireur chromiste : Philippe Massat, Atelier Vimagie.

Original collaboration in between the Museum Wearable represented by Flavia Sparacino, chief technologist and creative director of the Sensing Places company, and MIT researcher, and the work of original reproduction of Paul Gauguin's paintings, according to the principle of digital impression or digital artistic reproductions (DAR) developed by the artist Etienne Trouvers.

The Museum Wearable is a portable audio-visual augmented reality device that delivers to the visitor a dynamic and reconfigurable audio-visual documentary of an exhibition based on his progress in the museum space. As the wearer observes a work of art he will also see, through the "private-eye" display, a virtual projection on the wall of the museum of an audiovisual résumé that explains and illustrates what he's looking at. The Museum Wearable relies on custom designed "location bulbs" to determinate the visitor's location in the exhibition space. Thus, he doesn't have to press any button to start the animation, nor deal with any other similar interface. To sum up, the Museum Wearable is the most advanced version of the traditional audio guide as it provides a combination of both video and audio information automatically triggered by the location bulbs. By personalizing the visit of the museum and making it more attractive and intelligible thanks to the object-centered mini-documentaries, this device offers both an educational and entertaining alternative to the traditional museum experience.

The versatility of digital processing and the qualitative threshold of materials made possible the artistic digital reproductions imagined by Etienne Trouvers; which are works of art corresponding to the criteria of the contemporary way of life, while maintaining the highest level of aesthetic excellence. The realization of the Paul Gauguin portfolio, registered at the Cabinet des Estampes de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, recently made a sizable reduction in the perceptible difference between work and its copy, by reproducing all the chromatic complexity of pictorial art.

Thus, Flavia Sparacino and Etienne Trouvers are willing to explore three Tahitian paintings of Gauguin: /Ta Matete/ (the Market), /Te Nave Nave Fenua/ (Delicious Earth) /Les seins aux fleurs rouges.

Ta Matete, Paul Gauguin, Kunstmuseum, Bâle.
RNA d'Etienne Trouvers, novembre 2004.
Crédits photographiques : Isabel Duarte.

The mayor of Hiva Oa commissioned Etienne Trouvers to produce twenty four digital, artistic, life size reproductions for the centenary of Paul Gauguin's death. They are exhibited in the Paul Gauguin Cultural Centre inaugurated on the 8th May, 2003 in Atuona, on the Island of Hiva Oa in the Marquises archipelago.

What do computer generated techniques specifically bring to the evolution in reproduction art? The digital conservation of image printable by inkjet printer, had not, until now, found a technique that allowed reproduction to once more lay claim to its right as an art. The way Etienne Trouvers employs this art rips it clear of its association with banal contemporary use. He plants it firmly back in the fertile soil of the inventive and inspirational 18th C where technique grew from creative energy.

A painter has returned the interpreted image to « the field of art » and in doing so has revealed unexpected perspectives of which this homage to Gauguin, a quite understandable homage owed to the origin of colour- is the first step in the initiation of eye and mind. What can we expect in reaction to this process which has reformed the language of both print interpretation and imaginative work? (And where are the other artistic forays into this medium today?)

We can expect astonishment, certainly, at the fidelity of the reproductions which have a quasi inexistent deterioration of quality (a level never before achieved) but also, and maybe even more so, we can expect admiration for the rich sensuality and near nobility of this medium.

The "Répliques Numériques Artistiques (RNA)" (Digital Artistic Reproductions from cultural heritage),as well as the "Multiples artistiques numériques" created from its own creation, thanks to the plasticity of digital imagery and to newly available equipment, have made possible a real response to the complex chromatic modulations of a Gauguin or its personal paintings. Now we too can, through this digitally printed work, experience the fresh innocence and capacity to be surprised. Pascal Torres Guardiola, conservateur au Cabinet des dessins, Musée du Louvre.

Thanks to ICHIM05, Etienne Trouvers is happy to collaborate with the Flavia Sparicino's experimental Wearable Museum in order to serve Cultural Heritage.

Special thanks to ICHIM, Christophe Leclercq, Marianne Serra, Guillaume Herda, Kinga Grzech.