Leuven's M Museum offers a tour of its artistic heritage with HololensMicrosoft's augmented reality system. Take a stroll through an exceptional monument and discover the new exhibition ‘Between Heaven and Earth - The Last Supper of Bouts’ in a whole new way.

In a previous article, I talked about the tour with Aumgented Reality dedicated to Van Eyck. Today, it is another experience of Augmented Reality that I'm writing about: Leuven's M Museum with the exhibition Between Heaven and Earth - The last Supper of Bouts.

Although the title of the exhibition focuses on the Last Supper, Dieric Bouts' masterpiece, the theme of the visit is the history of Leuven, its relationship with the church, works of art and so on. Here, there is no climactic narrative about a visit to a single work, but rather the discovery and exploitation of a history and heritage.

Hololens or tablet, you select

The AR system offered by the museum is Microsoft's Hololens. But you can also borrow a tablet if you feel more comfortable with this device.

Unlike the system at Saint-Bavon, the route is not marked out by a virtual trail, but by a series of stickers placed on the floor. Their dark colour is sometimes difficult to distinguish from the black and white marble floor of the church.

Interactivity on the menu

To activate the holograms, you need to point your finger at the virtual buttons on the menu. This is a little surprising at first, but you soon get used to the system. What's more, interacting ‘physically’ with the menu reinforces the impression of real manipulation.

Whereas the Van Eyck tour took place in a dark crypt, the Leuven tour takes you on a tour of an a giorno lit church. a giorno.  This gives you the chance to contemplate the countless works of art along the way. Although, through the glasses, it is rather difficult to see the details of the paintings, sculptures or other pieces of gold smithery. The downside is that, at some stations, the external lighting through the stained-glass interferes with the virtual images and makes them less distinct.

The other difference is that you are also surrounded by people who have nothing to do with your virtual visit. But the faithful are going about their religious business, and other visitors carefully avoid interfering with these strangely helmeted beings. They pass discreetly behind you, leaving your field of vision clear, with a great deal of discipline.

A highly diversified AR path

The journey starts at the scale model of the cathedral A very rare piece. It is a model of the church as designed by the ‘Master of the Towers’, Joost Massys. It shows the towers that were to be the tallest in the Netherlands, with the central tower reaching a height of 150 metres… Unfortunately, this was without taking into account the instability of the ground. The building sank into the ground and the towers were reduced in size.

The tour continues with the tomb of Henri I, Duke of Brabantwith the head of Christ - last vestige of the " crooked cross ‘after a dramatic fire. Then there's the Edelheere tryptic, a copy of the The Descent from the Cross by Rogier Van Der Weyden at the Prado in Madrid. It is a work that has been copied many times because of the emotion it conveys. The painter was the first to depict grief with such intensity, as shown in the detail below.

Then, you can discover the two panels of the Martyrdom of Saint-Clement and Saint-Catherine, by Jan Rombouts, a 16th-century Leuven painter.

Next are the Saint-Margaret Chapel and its reliquary, and above all the two paintings by Dieric Bouts: the Altarpiece of the Blessed Sacrament - with the central scene depicting the Last Supper and the Martyrdom of Saint Erasmus. A very rare occurrence: these two works were created for this church in the 1460s and are still in situ. The Last Supper, with its central perspective, would become a model for many other painters over the centuries.

The Hololens tour continues with the Eucharistic TowerThis 12-metre-high sculptural structure housed the communion wafers before mass.

Your next discovery is the Triumphal cross of Jan Borreman II, the second member of the family of artists that would dominate Brabant sculpture for three generations.

This triumphal cross of painted and carved oak is perched on the rood screen, the part that separates the choir from the nave.

Jan Borreman or Borman II is also the author of the famous Altarpiece of Saint-Georgeswhich has just been restored and can once again be seen at the Royal Museums of Art and History in Brussels.

The Hololens tour continues with the Sedes Sapientiae (or Chair of Wisdom), a statue of Mary with the Christ Child that has become the emblem of the KUL (Catholic University of Leuven, Dutch-speaking, not to be confused with its French-speaking counterpart, the UCL).

And finally, the tour ends at the Brewers' Chapel. This is where the visual side of Augmented Reality is most impressive: a virtual model of the medieval city appears at your waist height, showing you the countless breweries that existed in Leuven. Water was unsafe, so beer was a safer drink, even for children...

A very educational Hololens tour

Unlike the Van Eyck tour, this one does not focus on a single work, despite its title in reference to the painter Dieric Bouts. Instead, it immerses visitors in the historical context of the Collegiate Church of St Peter and its artistic, historical and architectural heritage.

Each stage is accompanied by visual animations, audio commentary and background information. Augmented Reality presents monuments or places linked to the object being examined.

Although less visually spectacular than the Ghent tour, this itinerary perfectly fulfils its didactic mission without ever being boring. The fact that it takes place in a space frequented by other audiences is not a hindrance, and in fact helps to put it into context.

The photo accompanying the article is a composition of a personal photo of the Chapelle des Brasseurs in the collegiate church of Saint-Pierre in Louvain and the cliché « Hollens! » of Matt Biddulph sous licence CC BY-SA 2.0

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