The festival of light in St. Petersburg will be held on November 4, 5 at Palace Square and on the Petrogradskaya Embankment near Aurora 
Automatic translate
3D mapping technologies that create incredible optical illusions are very popular and loved around the world. Hundreds of thousands of spectators gather publicly accessible light shows in the city on the Neva, and despite the fact that the Festival of Light, initiated by the Tourism Development Committee of St. Petersburg, is only a year old, it has already become a must-see of the international cultural calendar.
The first show was held in April 2016 - the screen was the facade of the oldest imperial Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. In November 2016, the facades of the Mariinsky Palace and St. Isaac’s Cathedral showed 3D multimedia performances dedicated to St. Petersburg. The enchanting show on St. Isaac’s Square, which received enthusiastic responses and a wide resonance not only in the city, but also in the country, was seen by over 400 thousand spectators. In April 2017, the Festival of Light integrated the facade of the St Petersburg Arena Stadium into visual technology. And now everyone is waiting again for the new fall festival season to come.
The next holiday of light will be held in St. Petersburg on November 4 and 5 and promises to be grandiose - an unprecedented number of performances is expected.
The main parties in the new 3D-representation on the Palace Square will immediately perform two world-famous architectural masterpieces.
In the year of the 100th anniversary of the revolution, an epic canvas dedicated, of course, to the events of the fateful 1917, will unfold on the facade of the General Staff building. Spectators will enjoy visual and emotional immersion in the atmosphere of the tectonic shift era. The 1917 project does not set out to answer on whose side the descendants are — it intentionally does not contain unambiguous conclusions. Everyone who comes to the Palace Square will be asked to change the usual accent of perception: not to evaluate, but to try to understand and accept the past, with all the inspiring, frightening, connected at once seemingly incompatible events.
On the facade of the General Staff Building, which will turn into a giant screen for two evenings, images of revolutionary hard times will appear. The plot of the multimedia performance will cover all the key events of the turning year - New Year’s celebrations in the onset of a hungry winter, the February Revolution, workers’ strikes, the abdication of Nicholas II from the throne, April theses of Lenin, the storming of the Winter Palace… We will witness how stale bread turns into hungry gold into hungry the days of February 1917, we feel the force of the wind of change and look into the abyss that can change everything at once.
The guests of the show will find countless art-video effects, images and plots, and the most spectacular from the point of view of mapping is the extraordinary "transformations" of the General Staff building itself into the Winter Palace, Putilovsky Factory, Matilda Kshesinsky’s mansion, and Alexandrinsky Theater…
What the 1917 project claims to be is simply necessary today: at the turn of the 100th anniversary, a reboot is needed. The lesson is not history, but humanism, love, kindness, mercy - all that a person so urgently needs, no matter what time he lives. In the history of our city and our country, full of trials and victories, suffering and achievements, all this was. There are now. It is only necessary not to lose.
The author of the concept and the developer of the 3D multimedia performance “1917” on the facade of the General Staff building is the team of the creative brand Dance Open. The graphics are created by Cosmo AV (France), a recognized leader in the field of large-format video projections for world-class shows. In St. Petersburg, the Cosmo AV creative bureau is known for its 3D-mapping projects in honor of the celebration of the Hermitage’s birthday - Hermitage. Ball of History ”(the 250th anniversary of the museum, December 2014) and“ The Mystery of the Light ”(December 2016), as well as work on the 3D show about St. Petersburg“ The Space Between Heaven and Neva, ”which was shown on the facade of the Mariinsky Palace in November last year.
This year, for the first time at the Festival of Light, a competition of artists-mappers will be held on Palace Square. The idea of creative struggle was prompted by the audience themselves: a year ago, after showing two performances on St. Isaac’s Square, a spontaneous vote arose on social networks for the one they liked. This year the tradition will continue: the audience will choose the best video projection performance out of five presented by the teams of Italy, Russia, Poland, France and Spain. On the facade of the Winter Palace, each team in its own unique manner will illustrate one of the five popular favorite songs about St. Petersburg and will become part of the program “I keep this city” - a multimedia dedication to St. Petersburg.
What will be demonstrated on the facade of the Winter Palace is much more than just a city fashion event. Viewers will see a real performance about love, the main role in which is assigned to the solemnly golden, brilliant and detached Petersburg. It will be a declaration of love for rains, bridges, lions and sphinxes; a kaleidoscope of emotions in which the freshness of the wind, the light of white nights, the music of the palaces, the winding quests of the through courtyards and the cold shine of the frayed stairs lead to the depths of the soul, history and memory of the city and its inhabitants.
Viewers will be given a unique opportunity to determine the best 3D-mapping performance themselves: an open vote will take place on a specially created web page, where everyone can express their sympathies to a particular participant. Details will be announced on the website of the Festival of Light, as well as in the festival groups on social networks.
The second part of the Autumn Festival of Light will unfold on Petrograd Embankment - the landmark event “100 Years of the October Revolution”. At the center of the event is the legendary cruiser Aurora, whose volley changed the course of world history, marking the beginning of a revolution.
For the first time, one of the festival’s venues will be the ship itself, on which for two days in a row, starting at 7 pm, a unique 3D multimedia show will be demonstrated. The construction of the cruiser and the combat path of the Aurora, recognizable historical milestones of the early twentieth century, the famous volley, revolution, the subsequent most important events of the country and its modern images will be presented in a bewitching three-dimensional dimension. The show will use mapping technologies that strike video and sound effects, powerful lighting devices and pyrotechnics.
On November 4 and 5, 3D-show sessions will be broadcast on Palace Square - from 19.00 to 23.00, on Petrogradskaya Embankment - from 19.00 to 22.00.
Free admission.
Increased security measures will ensure the comfort of spectators in the conditions of free attendance of a mass event in the evening.
Festival of Light Organizer:
Tourism Development Committee of St. Petersburg with the support of the Government of St. Petersburg
Implement the project:
On Palace Square - Creative brand Dance Open (http://www.danceopen.com)
On Petrogradskaya Embankment - Triumph LLC
In the 3d-mapping program, competitions at the Palace Square will feature: