LONDON.- For the past 2 decades, Jonathan Yeo has forged an international reputation as one of the leading portrait painters of his generation with an illustrious list of sitters including Tony Blair, Malala Yousafzai, Cara Delevingne, Idris Elba, Dennis Hopper, Nicole Kidman, Damien Hirst and Sir David Attenborough,. Working in a genre often regarded as ‘traditional’, in recent years Yeo has reframed expectations through his ongoing exploration of new media and experimental technology. Now Yeo takes this a stage further with the launch of his revolutionary new Studio App – a multi-experience, interactive and fully 3-dimensional augmented reality version of the artist’s own studio.

Developed in-house by Yeo with a small team of specialists, the Studio App opens up the world of the artist’s studio, providing a unique insight into the usually hidden and private process of the portrait painter, including ‘fly on the wall’ access of the interaction between artist and sitter. The launch of the app is timed to coincide with the live reveal on 19th September of a new portrait of long-time friend, Jamie Oliver.

Part of an ongoing dynamic series of portraits, which has also included Dexter Fletcher, Fearne Cotton and Professor Brian Cox, the painting of Oliver was created during the isolation of lockdown using Face Time. Thousands of viewers have been able to follow and enjoy the progress of this and the others in the series with each session broadcast live over social media – creating a unique opportunity to eavesdrop on the usually private and intimate encounter between artist and sitter, as well as glimpsing the painter’s working methods, mistakes and all.

The studio app offers another dimension for users to experience how the portrait of Oliver was created and demonstrates Oliver – one of the first people to try the app – enjoying some of the playful, interactive features which will allow users to enter the world of the studio as if they were really there. “Your 3D app has blown my mind” commented Oliver, adding: “it’s always nice to use technology to break down the fourth wall”

Disappointed by rushed offerings of “virtual” experiences and viewing rooms during lockdown, Yeo developed the app as a way of allowing people to visit the studio remotely using augmented reality and the latest 3D technology. Building on his knowledge of virtual reality and 3D technologies gathered when creating innovative sculpture for the Royal Academy of Arts’ From Life exhibition in 2018, Yeo and his team started exploring ways of using immersive tech to create a different kind of experience: “We knew it was theoretically possible to combine existing technologies and build something like this, using a powerful enough system, for people to experience through a VR headset. What we were surprised to discover was that we could make a version accessible to anyone with a smartphone too,

The resulting app has been created entirely by Yeo and his in-house team, is not only a new way to enter the artist’s real environment but also uses game engine technology to add content and experiences which wouldn’t be possible in the physical world. You can watch a holographic Yeo painting a portrait, find hidden content around the studio and even take photos of your friends as if they were in the room.

Yeo observes that “in the future people will not only be able to remotely visit artists’ studios and galleries as convincingly as if they were actually there, but also to interact with the people and objects they encounter, whether real or virtual. Technology is going to revolutionise the way audiences can see and experience art in the future and this becomes even more relevant in our new, pandemic framed world”




Jonathan Yeo Studio app In detail

· The app opens a photorealistic 3D artists studio which can be viewed either as a scaled-down model or explored as if a real world space

· The realism was enhanced by the use of a complex and photorealistic 3D model, optimised for use in augmented reality on mobile devices

· Multiple video projections can be triggered, one of which recreates a portrait sitting with Jamie Oliver over FaceTime, all of which generate a sense of activity in different parts of the studio and allow the user to effectively curate their own experience

· Other interactive elements include the ability to record your own pictures and video from any point of view in the studio. There is also a setting which allows you to photograph your friends as if they are in the actual room

· Developed over the past 6 months by Yeo, working with Vitaliy Tyzhnevyy – a specialist developer who joined Yeo’s team fresh from the Games Programming course at Goldsmiths – and his studio manager Ruben Cooke, they created the entire experience from scratch. None of them had developed an app before

· Built using Unity3D game engine software which allows wide scope for adding more layers of interactivity to the app and the plan is to continue adding further content and experiences over the coming months

· Free to download on your phone from the Apple app store for iPhone users with iPhone7 and up - or iPad 5th generation and up, the Jonathan Yeo Studio App offers a tantalising glimpse into a truly accessible future world for the visual arts. Android users can download the app from Google Play