Group of Japanese and American artists launches on internet 360-degree virtual tour of Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum
Aug. 10, 2020
by Yuji Yamamoto, Staff Writer
1Future, a group of Japanese and American artists, has completed and begun to post on the internet a digital video production that enables viewers to experience a virtual tour of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, located in the city’s Naka Ward. The digital tour can be accessed on the web until August 31. Timed with the release of the virtual tour, the group also plans to hold other online events.
The work was carried out as part of the Zero Project 2020, an initiative involving members such as Cannon Hersey, 43, an artist based in New York who is a grandson of the late John Hersey, an American journalist known for having documented the conditions in Hiroshima after the atomic bombing in his book titled Hiroshima.
The group’s film team captured images while moving 360-degree cameras about two meters for each new shot in the museum’s building, ultimately taking images at about 300 locations. The photographs have been compiled into the work “Future Memory.” After accessing the work, viewers can click the digital imagery on the screen and view exhibits as if they were taking a walking tour through the museum’s main building.
Viewers can experience the museum’s exhibits on the screen three-dimensionally, including clothes worn by school students mobilized to work for the war effort who were killed in the atomic bombing, as well as a stone onto which a human shadow was etched by the bomb’s thermal rays. As high-definition images have been used in the work, viewers can also read the descriptions placed beside each exhibit. In addition, the work includes a section of 3-D still-life objects created by shooting frame-by-frame photos of 15 A-bombed artifacts, such as a melted rice bowl, whose owners were lost in the bombing.
1Future kicked off the Zero Project three years ago, based on sponsorship from the Hiroshima International Cultural Foundation. This year, amid the coronavirus pandemic, the group has been engaged in the project online. On August 30, the group will hold an event in which Cannon Hersey describes an episode about his grandfather during the period when John Hersey was writing Hiroshima. Other events are scheduled for the project, as well, including an online video concert, at which the Japanese musician Motoharu Sano will perform, and a gallery of works by artists from five nations.
Cannon Hersey said he would like to convey memories of Hiroshima while utilizing modern technology to allow many people to access and experience them. For details, please visit: https://www.1futurejapan.com/
Until August 31
“Future Memory,” virtual tour of exhibits at Hiroshima Peace
Memorial Museum / Virtual gallery of artists from five nations
across the world
On August 17, 9:00 p.m.
Concert by musicians including Motoharu
On August 30, 6:00 p.m.
“John Hersey: The Meaning of Memory,” with Cannon Hersey as
speaker
(Originally published on August 10, 2020)
1Future, a group of Japanese and American artists, has completed and begun to post on the internet a digital video production that enables viewers to experience a virtual tour of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, located in the city’s Naka Ward. The digital tour can be accessed on the web until August 31. Timed with the release of the virtual tour, the group also plans to hold other online events.
The work was carried out as part of the Zero Project 2020, an initiative involving members such as Cannon Hersey, 43, an artist based in New York who is a grandson of the late John Hersey, an American journalist known for having documented the conditions in Hiroshima after the atomic bombing in his book titled Hiroshima.
The group’s film team captured images while moving 360-degree cameras about two meters for each new shot in the museum’s building, ultimately taking images at about 300 locations. The photographs have been compiled into the work “Future Memory.” After accessing the work, viewers can click the digital imagery on the screen and view exhibits as if they were taking a walking tour through the museum’s main building.
Viewers can experience the museum’s exhibits on the screen three-dimensionally, including clothes worn by school students mobilized to work for the war effort who were killed in the atomic bombing, as well as a stone onto which a human shadow was etched by the bomb’s thermal rays. As high-definition images have been used in the work, viewers can also read the descriptions placed beside each exhibit. In addition, the work includes a section of 3-D still-life objects created by shooting frame-by-frame photos of 15 A-bombed artifacts, such as a melted rice bowl, whose owners were lost in the bombing.
1Future kicked off the Zero Project three years ago, based on sponsorship from the Hiroshima International Cultural Foundation. This year, amid the coronavirus pandemic, the group has been engaged in the project online. On August 30, the group will hold an event in which Cannon Hersey describes an episode about his grandfather during the period when John Hersey was writing Hiroshima. Other events are scheduled for the project, as well, including an online video concert, at which the Japanese musician Motoharu Sano will perform, and a gallery of works by artists from five nations.
Cannon Hersey said he would like to convey memories of Hiroshima while utilizing modern technology to allow many people to access and experience them. For details, please visit: https://www.1futurejapan.com/
Until August 31
“Future Memory,” virtual tour of exhibits at Hiroshima Peace
Memorial Museum / Virtual gallery of artists from five nations
across the world
On August 17, 9:00 p.m.
Concert by musicians including Motoharu
On August 30, 6:00 p.m.
“John Hersey: The Meaning of Memory,” with Cannon Hersey as
speaker
(Originally published on August 10, 2020)
