How to explain the success of immersive exhibitions?

Initially developed in the field of private cultural entertainment, immersive exhibitions are now widely deployed within public institutions, such as the National Navy Museum, the Orsay Museum, and the Picasso-Paris National Museum. The immersive device is part of a long history of art and reactivates older practices, based on illusionistic reenactments and the physical engagement of the visitor. Since the 19th century, dioramas and proto-fairground cinema engaged the viewer’s body, who freely moved around and observed the way children run or lie down in immersive exhibitions today. Jérôme Glicenstein, a professor in the Department of Plastic Arts at the University of Paris 8 Vincennes, questions “the promises and limits of immersion” (Jessica de Bideran, Antoine Roland, 2021) in the contemporary museum context.

“In recent years, there have been increasingly sophisticated immersive devices, thanks in particular to synthetic image reconstructions, augmented reality devices or virtual reality devices. Obviously, this has great scientific importance, but it can also turn into a kind of fairground attraction. Perhaps the limit lies in narrative effects. Entering a world, an environment in synthetic images to reconstruct a lost world is one thing. But accompanying this reconstruction with a narrative, a kind of fictionalization of the experience, then we enter into something else, more spectacular and which may refer to possible drifts.”

Jérôme Glicenstein reflects on the growing interest in immersive exhibitions: “If we observe the practices of these immersive devices, we realize that it reaches a much wider audience than the usual audience of art institutions, and a less informed audience who may relate to these narrative, fictionalization, or spectacular effects. It is easier to enter into artistic questions through this means than to simply confront oneself with a work. The question of context is becoming increasingly important. Today, it’s difficult to say to someone: Stand in front of this painting and look at it, and after a while, you will have a revelation. It’s not feasible anymore, in any case.”