Notre-Dame Cathedral: An Immersive Experience Through January 5, 2025
Still image of digital rendering of Notre-Dame Cathedral, Ars Electronica.
Still image of digital rendering of Notre-Dame Cathedral interior, Ars Electronica.
Still image of digital rendering of Notre-Dame Cathedral Rose Window, Ars Electronica.
To celebrate next month’s public reopening of Notre-Dame Cathedral after its intense five-year restoration, this exhibition brings to life a virtual, three-dimensional model of the architectural icon.
Visitors to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, are invited to step inside an ethereal, dream-like depiction of Notre-Dame, where digital renderings suggest the devastating April 2019 fire and the subsequent damage, while also alluding to the extraordinary efforts undertaken to restore the structure.
In Paris, the iconic Gothic cathedral will reopen to the public on Saturday, December 7, 2024. The MFAH is celebrating this historic moment with Notre-Dame Cathedral: An Immersive Experience, in the Museum’s spacious Cullinan Hall.
The MFAH experience is created by Ars Electronica in partnership with French start-ups Iconem and Histovery. The presentation employs point cloud data compiled by the late, renowned Belgian art historian and Vassar College professor Andrew Tallon, who created three-dimensional laser scans of the cathedral in 2010. This information, in addition to supplemental material by Histovery, proved instrumental in guiding the reconstruction of the cathedral.
Over the past five years, a team of nearly 2,000 professionals—including conservators, carpenters, glassmakers, locksmiths, engineers, and scaffolding experts—has worked both on-site and in workshops across France to restore Notre-Dame. The MFAH presentation showcases a digital walkthrough of the legendary architectural features of the cathedral, including its famed stained-glass windows, and helps to highlight the role of new technologies in preserving and communicating humanity’s cultural heritage.
Ready to Visit?
Member and ALL ACCESS tickets include same-day admission to this exhibition, all Special Exhibitions, and the MFAH Permanent Collections. On Thursday, entry to this exhibition is included with a ticket to the Permanent Collections.
Get Your TicketNotre-Dame Cathedral: An Immersive Experience / November 23, 2024–January 5, 2025
The exhibition is organized by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and supported by Villa Albertine, Alliance Francaise de Houston, Archaeology Now, Iconem, and Histovery. The videos are made possible thanks to data compiled by art historian Dr. Andrew Tallon, Yann Arthus Bertrand and TSVP. The resulting videos were created by Ars Electronica and their production team: Patrick Berger, Melinda File, Roland Haring, Raphael Schaumburg-Lippe.