59 Productions Creates DEEP TIME Artwork for Edinburgh International Festival, Aug. 7

Multi award-winning artists 59 Productions are to create an epic, outdoor, public artwork transforming Castle Rock and Edinburgh Castle to mark the start of the festival season using cutting-edge projection mapping techniques, as Director Fergus Linehan announces them as Associate Artists of the International Festival for the next three years.

Deep Time is a digitally animated artwork created by 59 Productions uniting spectacular projected animation and lighting with a specially-compiled soundtrack of music by Scottish rock band Mogwai. This free, public outdoor event will kick off Edinburgh's festival season during the opening weekend of the Edinburgh International Festival, at 10.30pm on Sunday 7 August.

Delving deep into 350 million years of Edinburgh's history, this dazzling festival opener reimagines the ancient site from which the city sprang, using iconic Edinburgh Castle and Castle Rock - a volcanic plug of 350 million-year-old dolerite - as the rugged canvas for spellbinding projections and illuminations inspired by its deep geological history.

As well as exploring the geological legacy of its setting, Deep Time recalls the intellectual legacy of the city and in particular James Hutton, the Edinburgh-born scientist and 'father of modern geology' who first proposed that the Earth was billions of years old in the 18th century, drawing on evidence he found in the city around him.

As 2016 marks Scotland's Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design, Deep Time also reflects on Edinburgh Castle, that dominant figure on the city's skyline, and one of the longest continually inhabited sites in Scotland - from a Bronze Age settlement to the spectacular edifice we see today, across almost 3000 years of Scottish history.

59 Productions return to the Edinburgh International Festival with Deep Time in 2016 as newly-appointed Associate Artists to the International Festival for the next three years. In 2015, they opened the Festival under its then newly-appointed Director, Fergus Linehan, with The Harmonium Project, a free outdoor event marking the 50th anniversary of the Edinburgh Festival Chorus. It brought crowds of almost 20,000 people into Festival Square and Lothian Road to see a spectacular audio-visual transformation of Usher Hall.

Fergus Linehan, Director of the Edinburgh International Festival: "59 Productions have, time and again, created innovative and compelling work in the fields of music, theatre, opera, film and visual arts while pioneering the use of new technologies. We are delighted to be working with such a remarkable group of artists over the next three years."

Leo Warner, Creative Director of 59 Productions and director of Deep Time: "We are delighted to be returning to Edinburgh to present Deep Time as the opening event of the International Festival this year. Celebrating the city and its history with a free public show that combines theatricality, spectacle and new technology feels totally appropriate for a Festival - and a city - which has been the birthplace of so much ingenuity and creativity over the years. We are particularly thrilled to be appointed Artistic Associates of the Festival and we look forward to developing our relationship with, and creating new work for the Edinburgh International Festival audience over the coming years."

59 Productions is the multi award-winning company of artists behind the video design of the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympic Games, the Tony Award-winning An American in Paris currently running on Broadway, globe-trotting smash hit, War Horse, and record-breaking David Bowie is exhibition. 59 Productions combine technology and art to tell amazing stories. Led by Creative Directors Leo Warner, Mark Grimmer, Lysander Ashton, Richard Slaney and Ben Pearcy, they are world leaders specialising in design for stage and live events. Since 2006, 59 Productions has mounted more than 120 productions across the world at venues including the National Theatre, Royal Court, Young Vic, the Royal Opera House, English National Opera, New York's Metropolitan Opera as well as at theatre festivals in Salzburg, Berlin and Avignon.

Check out their promo video!

www.59productions.co.uk

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