The municipality of Tuusula in Finland took a step towards virtual cultural experiences in the midst of social distancing and lockdowns.
An immersive experience of Halosenniemi, the atelier home of the artist Pekka Halonen, offers an inclusive online experience to everyone, everywhere and anytime.
| Client | Municipality of Tuusula |
| AR Production | Arilyn |
Halosenniemi is a place on the shore of Tuusula Lake in southern Finland that offered ideas and inspiration to the artist Pekka Halonen in the early 1900s. Halonen is one of the most beloved artists of the Golden Era of Finnish art. He absorbed the international trends and applied them to the depiction of Finnish nature, for which Tuusula Lake was the ideal surrounding.
Halonen's studio opened to the public in the 1950s as a museum dedicated to Pekka Halonen and his life and art. In 2020, the studio took a step into the future as the XR experience HALO Open Art Studio.
Visit the HALO Open Art Studio from Tuusula's Elämisen taidetta (Art of Living) -website.
The immersive virtual studio experience's goal was to enable a museum experience during the challenging times we lived in for a few years. The municipality of Tuusula also wanted to make the experience available for all: it is unobstructed, like most XR experiences. The virtual museum allows people everywhere to explore the setting and the art of the beloved artist without the trouble of travelling.
The HALO Open Art Studio was created using photogrammetry and 3D modelling and is available as a WebXR experience. The XR art studio was presented at Tuusula Housing Fair in August 2020 as part of the Fair program.
The HALO experience presents six pieces from Pekka Halonen and their stories, along with the atelier itself. There's also a surprise hidden in the atelier!
Virtual spaces have other advantages in addition to offering cultural experiences whenever and wherever. They are easy to modify to speak to audiences during different seasons and celebrations.
HALO Open Art Studio added a surprise performer to the experience for Christmas 2020. The atelier was updated to be more Christmassy, and a holographic character of the Finnish artist Stig greeted and entertained the visitors.
In spring 2021, we updated the Open Art Studio experience once again. The update featured the artist Stig performing another song with a new greeting to the visitors.
Three of the paintings also got a new dimension. By clicking them, information about the Artwork opens. That's not new, but along with the info is a button leading to a 360 view. The views are from the places where the Artworks in question were painted at.
HALO Open Art Studio is an excellent addition to the other immersive online museums and virtual culture and art experiences we've had the honour to co-create! You can visit the other augmented museum tours here: