While the business world explores the impact of AI and technology disruption, some are looking to the arts sector for creative input around imagined futures. We look at some of the bigger partnerships and sponsorships over the last few years and consider what’s next.
At the end of the 1990s, Sun Microsystems invested £2million in a technology lab at the ICA for artists to explore the new medium. Who better to push the boundaries of their products than contemporary artists? A number of companies continue to be active in this space, engaging a new generation of users of their products by supporting new creative talent – for example Adobe and We Transfer.
LG OLED has become a high-profile art sponsor, promoting high-specification tech hardware - its HD television - by partnering with artists. For Frieze 2024 John Akomfrah showed his work Becoming Wind at the fair, enabling a buzzing art world audiences to see the tvs in action.
As well as exploring what technology can do as part of the creative experience, arts organisations and their partners have also used the power of technology to increase their reach. NT Live, currently sponsored by Sky Arts, has been bringing filmed theatre into homes around the UK since 2009 and most recently into every UK secondary school.
For those unable to get a ticket to see the sell-out Griffin Catalyst exhibition Monet and London at the Courtauld, the digital tour is incredible, the small scale of the show (just 21 paintings) allowing you to zoom in close to each picture to imagine to brushwork, or just soak scan the gallery walls, comparing the colours and perspectives. Stunning.
Google Arts & Culture uses similar technology, while providing a smorgasbord approach – including blending its excellent Art Zooms (where pop music stars narrate paintings they love) with Google Earth tours of landmarks like the Louvre to simple ‘build your own gallery’ games. In a world where content is king, mining the riches of the world’s cultural institutions is a great move.
It seems almost impossible to imagine visiting a cultural event these days without being accompanied by the ever-insightful, Bloomberg Connects app – now including over 550 cultural institutions around the world. Bloomberg Philanthropies has always led in the tech space and its Digital Accelerator programme funds both infrastructure and innovation.
What’s next? Well, unsurprisingly it’s the technology and media companies who have been fastest to engage. But as all businesses invest resources in exploring the disruption and opportunities that AI is fast bringing, who better to engage a B2B audience in imagined futures than the writers, artists and inventors?
Organisations like the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), FORMA, and Serpentine Gallery are leaders in this space. 180 Studios and Somerset House on the Strand are home to a number of cultural innovators in tech, and a highlight exhibition for 2025 is Wayne McGregor’s Infinite Bodies exhibition that explores artistic forms, scientific disciplines and cutting-edge technologies.
We’d like to see more companies working with these pioneers to collaborate and innovate or simply set the scene for conversations around a future of possibilities. Get in touch to find our more.