SAMSUNG

Samsung’s THE FRAME stands out from other televisions in that when off, it features a still artwork from a curated group of artists, with its luminosity adjusting to ambient light while. This optical trick, coupled with its high definition and its thin wood frame, truly give the impression of a painting or photograph hanging on the wall.

Samsung asked Formavision’s creative director – artist Sebastien Leon – to use a selection of his paintings to be featured as part of Samsung’s “THE FRAME” painting library.

At the occasion of its highly anticipated launch, we created an experiential exhibition that came to life through an 360 mural painting activated by black light spots, a musical performance by experimental lapsteel musician Kaia Fischer, closeup stills of paintings, as well as three-dimensional video scans of paintings that transformed abstract landscapes into hypnotic cosmic fly-throughs.

When day light returned, the walls turn back to white, and the wood-framed videos become high-definition stills of paintings, adjusting to the light intensity of the room.

Taking the concept of “The Frame” further, Samsung commissioned original video work for their new seamless extra-large OLED TV, called “The Wall”. We created “Echoes” and “Cymatics” as a series of six video loops to be featured as part of Samsung’s library of video art.

Each video uses scans of Leon’s paintings and transforms them into animated tableaux of computer-generated abstraction. In “Echoes”, an altitude is assigned to every color temperature, turning the works into journeys through outer space. In “Cymatics”, the film shows a hypnotic passage from painting to painting, with spray paint drips becoming falling particles.