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A 6,000-Person Tour of the Orion Nebula Lands in Brooklyn

'The Hubble Cantata' offers a unique performance combining virtual reality, science, and classical music.
All images courtesy of the artists

On August 6th in Prospect Park, 6,000 people will experience a tour of the Orion Nebula through a live virtual reality performance with the Hubble Telescope. At this unique VR experience, The Hubble Cantata, viewers will turn their attention to the skies while simultaneously participating in a communal event. It's a monumental occasion for audiences to be part of a community as well as the cosmos in a literally entirely new way.

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The Hubble Cantata, which has been an extremely collaborative project between artists and designers, will premiere as a part of the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! New York City festival. To raise money for the Prospect Park event, and for a future tour of the production, the creators have started a Kickstarter page. So far, they’ve raised over $7,000 and have assured The Creators Project that the event will happen regardless of whether they meet their fundraising goal of $35,000.

To experience The Hubble Cantata, viewers must download an app, which is expected to be released this week on the performance’s Kickstarter. Once audiences arrive at Prospect Park, they will be given free cardboard headsets to use with the app. No headphones are necessary as live musicians, including a Norwegian string section and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, will provide a live soundtrack. The Hubble Cantata is being designed at New Inc by composer Paola Prestini, librettist Royce Vavrek, filmmaker Eliza McNitt, and Hubble expert astrophysicist Mario Livio. The creators have also partnered with various audio and visual design experts to make distant space come alive.

To learn more about The Hubble Cantata, check out its Kickstarter and website.

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