A Hologram of Edgar Degas sculpture is on World Tour

The auction house Christie’s in San Francisco is having a high-tech solution to the increasing rates in the internationl shipping costs of works of art.

After announcing the upcoming auction  of the art collection of the late philanthropist Anne H. Bass, which includes major pieces of Edgar Degas, Mark Rothko and Monet, Christie’s is offerering a world tour of one of the Degas most popular sculptures: Petite danseuse de quatorze ans before the sale takes place in New York next May 12.

But how will it be possible to take a bronze sculpture to different Christie’s venues around the world in such a short time? Together with Los Angeles-based company Proto, the auction house produced a hologram which will travel to Hong Kong via the “cloud”. The company have said that the technology used in Degas hologram is the same used in Coachella to present Tupac’s performance.

On the other hand, Christie’s thinks the hologram can solve the problem of international transportation due to the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the high rates in the shipping prices. Even more important, this kind of exhibitions support by technological platfmos could be a possibility to avoid all the contamination that comes with the transportation of works of art by air or sea.