LONDON.- Today, the Museum of London revealed a new and interactive audio app, A Hollow Body, to coincide with its Sherlock Holmes season.

Created in partnership with collaborative art collective, Circumstance, A Hollow Body is a mobile app with an evocative music score and narration that guides two people on an atmospheric audio walking tour through the City of London’s streets and narrow alleys. It seeks to encourage users to become acquainted with the city in new and surprising ways.

A Hollow Body is designed to be experienced in pairs – much like how Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson move through the city in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories. The narration encourages users to observe the city, its inhabitants and buildings and to peel back its complex layers and stories, much like Sherlock might view the city.

Taking in locations surrounding the Museum of London, such as the Barbican Estate and St Bart’s Hospital, A Hollow Body encourages users to imagine they are walking through a film in which they are the main characters, with the City of London as the backdrop. It is an audio walking experience that lasts approximately 45 minutes and begins on the corner of Paternoster Square, close to St Paul’s Cathedral.

Emilie Rolland, Creative Partnerships Manager at the Museum of London, says: “Digital technologies are changing the way in which we engage with art, offering deepened interaction and participation. A Hollow Body is an experience for two people through the City of London, in the form of a mobile app. Part soundtrack; part walking tour, it is built around themes arising from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s great detective stories. We wanted to collaborate with Circumstance, an art collective known for creating intimate experiences in urban environments, as we felt they could create a unique experience, and take inspiration from Sherlock Holmes to give people the chance to connect with the city around them in a different way. Using a device as personal as a mobile phone as a vehicle not only increases the intimacy of the piece; but casts the pair in the starring role of their very own experience throughout the city.”

Duncan Speakman, co-founder of Circumstance, says: “A Hollow Body is an interactive guided audio-experience for two people in the City of London that begins with the download of an app. The soundtrack is not only in response to the bustling city itself, but also around the themes tackled in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s novels, such as trust, reliance and partnership. The music intertwined with a narrated story lets users play out an experience as they walk through the city. We want the duo to feel as if they are creating a series of scenes from a film. It’s not a story in a traditional sense, with a beginning, middle and end, but a narrative of experience; fostering new ways of seeing, feeling and being in the city.”

A Hollow Body is compatible for both Android and iPhone users and is available to download for free from Google Play and the App Store from 21 November 2014.