News

The National Gallery of the Cayman Islands is pleased to release the virtual tour of Alchemy: Horacio Esteban, part of a growing body of digital content NGCI has made available for visitors to its website, allowing viewers to experience the entirety of the exhibition from across the world. Alchemy presents a mid-career survey of work by Horacio Esteban, a key figure in the Native Sons artist collective and one of Cayman’s leading sculptors, whose work has featured in numerous NGCI exhibitions and has received widespread critical and public acclaim. The virtual tour takes the viewer on a journey through the exhibition that encompasses each of the various works that are on display, from intricate Caymanite carvings to stunning Cedar wood sculptures depicting an array of fantastical plants and wildlife.

The virtual tour starts at the beginning of the Lower Exhibition Hall, where viewers are presented with a clickable pop-up of the title wall. This allows a more accessible opportunity to read the Curator’s Statement in a larger text font. As the viewer moves through the space via arrow keys or clicking the buttons on the floor, they are similarly presented with clickable labels next to each artwork that show the title, medium, and short descriptive text. The tour guides users through the space to experience the exhibition from start to finish as they would first-hand; however, viewers are able to explore freely throughout the space - zooming in on the artworks and moving back and forth between the successive sequence of rooms. The format of this tour allows for a completely immersive experience of the space, from the intimate “Explorer’s Study” - a view of the artistic research process - to the forest of Cedar wood animals in the central “Jurassic Forest” room, featuring bug life and stunning fictional creatures in both miniature and massive scale – an environment that is intended to transport visitors into the vivid landscape of the artist’s imagination.

“NGCI’s virtual tours programme aims to extend remote access to all recent major exhibitions for visitors in the Sister Islands and all across the world. In our current global climate, with restrictions still limiting travel to and from Cayman, the virtual tours allow those abroad to see exhibitions at the National Gallery they would otherwise be unable to experience,” says Paige Jordison, NGCI Assistant Curator. “These tours are also intended to serve as a future archive for scholars researching Caymanian art and NGCI’s past exhibitions history, providing a wealth of information and the largest single repository of Caymanian visual culture accessible entirely online.” School groups also gain the opportunity to see NGCI exhibitions well after they close to the public, allowing teachers to continue developing lesson plans around the theme of a particular exhibition. Scheduled tours are also now available, virtually led by the NGCI Curatorial Team or Education Department, for public groups or school groups to see the exhibition. To inquire about these group tours, please contact education@nationalgallery.org.ky.

Each exhibition is created by NGCI’s Curatorial Team with occasional guest curators, and virtual tours are created by Dragonfly 360 Virtual Tours with special assistance from Vahe Dzaghgouni. These tours can be accessed on any device that supports a web browser. To see all virtual exhibition tours, please visit https://www.nationalgallery.org.ky/see/virtual-tours/.