Sculpture Projection Mapping for Galleries and Public Art

A sculpture already draws the eye. Projection mapping adds another layer, with color moving across its surface, a story unfolding in sequence, or a piece that seems to shift as people walk around it. Nothing is painted, drilled or permanently changed. When the show ends, the sculpture remains as it was.

We create sculpture projection mapping experiences for galleries, museums, artists and public art programs. If you have a work in mind, tell us about the sculpture and the space it sits in.

Projection mapping brings motion and narrative to a static piece without altering the original. Museums and galleries can project moving imagery directly onto sculptures instead of building costly physical sets or risking damage to originals.

The challenge is that a sculpture is seen from many sides, and a projection that looks perfect from one angle may distort from another. Sightlines come first, starting with where visitors will stand.

• Survey and model. We survey the space, measuring angles, reflectivity and ambient light, then model the room and align the projectors virtually before any hardware is installed.
• Content made for the piece. We create fully custom content around the work's theme, working from your concepts or references, and we can integrate visuals you already have.
• Care for the object. We carefully balance projection output to avoid overwhelming delicate artifacts or fatiguing visitors.
• Installation and rehearsal. Installation typically takes one to three days, followed by a full rehearsal with you to adjust brightness, timing and audio.
• Loops for walk-through spaces. In a gallery people drift in and out, so we design content loops that repeat every few minutes and still make sense to someone arriving mid-cycle.

Gallery and museum pieces sit in the controlled, dimmer light projection likes best. Ambient light reduces contrast and vibrancy, so a gallery's lighting plan is part of our planning.

Changing exhibitions benefit most over time. Projection allows rotating shows without repainting walls or moving heavy objects, and the content can shift from one exhibition to the next with a software update.

Textured and curved works are suitable as long as they hold still. We can project onto almost any non-transparent surface, including statues and textured or curved objects, provided the surface is stable and within the projector's range.

Pieces made for projection are another route. Artists can build a work with projection in mind, so the form and the light are designed together from the start.

Civic statues and monuments in public squares are covered on our landmark projection page, and painted walls on our projection murals page.

• Toro Verde Interactive Museum: In the Deep Sea Wonders exhibit, local artists sculpted coral from recycled materials, and kiosk buttons trigger projection mapping effects that spotlight different parts of the coral bed with their own timings and lighting patterns.
• National Geographic: Beneath the Blue: At the D23 Expo in Anaheim, California, we enlisted local artists to make sculptures from reclaimed materials, which stood as the foreground for our 360 visuals. National Geographic also tasked us with curating the show's featured artists.
• Worldmark by Wyndham art installation: We collaborated with Master Graffiti Artist Robert Gomez to combine his still murals with our immersive digital content.

Send us photos of the piece, its rough size, where it will be shown and the dates. We will come back with how we would survey it, light it and build content around it. For the wider range of surfaces we map, see our projection mapping services, or contact our team to start.