JADAR

★★★★☆

Whilst Outernet uses its four walls to showcase digital art, Lightroom is, essentially, a cinema, that presents documentary films on four walls and a digital floor. So far, it has painted the world with David Hockney and flown to space with Tom Hanks – and now it is strutting the runway with VOGUE.

Such experiences generally revolve around a visual artist (generally Van Gogh!). The experience brings the artist’s works to life, blowing up the paintings so that every single detail can be appreciated. They also turn the paintings into moving images, trapping visitors inside the works.

Lightroom’s first experience, which revolved around David Hockney, did that but presented it in a documentary film in which we not only appreciated Hockney’s works visually but also aurally: we got to learn all about the man behind the paintings.

I was curious as to how well it would work with cinematography rather than art. Though I imagine the footage in The Moonwalkers looks wonderful blown up on screens, playing all around the audience, transporting them to space.

Turning Lightroom into a runway, however, is even more ambitious. But it’s also admirable, for fashion is often criticised for being exclusive and inaccessible, and few people will ever have the opportunity to attend a fashion show. The internet and social media have, to some extent, democratised fashion and fashion shows, and some designers even allow people at home to attend their shows virtually. But Inventing the Runway is very much a case of, “If you cannot go to the show, the show will come to you.”

It is, essentially, a 50-minute film played on a loop, with no real beginning and end, allowing people to enter whenever and leave as they please, without feeling like they have missed anything important. Whilst a linear narrative might have felt more interesting and fulfilling, allowing visitors to properly understand and appreciate how the runway has changed, that would not work for this experience. Instead, the film is split into chapters, each with its own theme. It quickly becomes apparent that the film is as much about reinventing the runway as it is inventing it.

A whistle-stop tour, the film covers a lot of ground (literally) in 50 minutes. It’s a double-edged sword, for it needs to cram a lot in so that it can adequately show how the runway has evolved, but this is at the expense of substantial detail and information. It thus feels a bit rushed and, ironically, surface-level. You are immersed into one runway show only to be pulled out of it and thrown into another.

However, this ensures that audiences are constantly enticed and never lose interest – indeed, I could not believe it when we got back to the segment that we started with. It also captures the fast-paced nature of the ever-evolving fashion industry, where the bright young thing will quickly become so last year.

The film can be incredibly cinematic, especially when we are shown footage from the more daring fashion shows, from Karl Lagerfield’s rocket launch to the “on location” shows, beginning with Lagerfield’s show on the Great Wall of China (which is responsible for the trend). As aforementioned, these walls have previously been used to turn physical art into moving images, and this film occasionally references that, alongside its high-quality footage. The best example is, again, the rocket launch: the footage is shown only on the main screen, with added smoke appearing on the two side screens, as if coming from the rocket. It’s very clever.

However, one could criticise this exhibition for prioritising the main screen – and making it the main screen – rather than fully utilising all three of the full walls, though I appreciate that this might feel suffocating and overwhelming. It could also make better use of the digital floor. Of course, the fourth wall (where visitors enter) is not full, and there is sadly no screen on the ceiling, which makes the immersive aspect feel incomplete. You just have to look forward and sideways, not back nor up, to feel fully immersed.

Some might render Lightroom a glorified cinema but I, personally, would call it a cinematic experience that allows visitors to immerse themselves into films and art. The room could be improved with some more comfortable seating, allowing visitors to sit back (or lie down) and relax; it becomes a little difficult to lose yourself into the world when you find yourself (and others) fidgeting in discomfort, which repeatedly takes you out of it.

The experience could also benefit from something more tangible, à la another space where art work is physically brought to life (such as the sunflower room and physical Bedroom in Arles at Van Gogh Alive!) though I recognise that the creatives might find these photo ops tacky.

VOGUE: Inventing the Runway is a cinematic history lesson, taught by none other than Cate Blanchett, that races down the catwalk and throughout history. It invites the masses into the exclusive industry but only for glimpses of countless shows. The narrative could feel more substantial, though Blanchett’s narration and delivery are divine (but let’s be real, she could make the Yellow Pages interesting).

VOGUE: Inventing the Runway runs at Lightroom until April 26.

Photo: Justin Sutcliffe for Lightroom