‘Augmented Australia’ exhibition premieres in Australia following inaugural presentation at Venice Biennale

Australia’s exhibition from the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale will be premiered in Australia as part of the 2014 Sydney Architecture Festival, which runs from 1 until 10 November 2014. Augmented Australia 1914 – 2014 is a virtual exhibition launching on 31 October – on the eve of the Festival – presented free of charge until 15 December 2014 at Customs House in Sydney and also experienced by downloading a free smartphone app.

Augmented Australia 1914-2014 by felix._Giles_Anderson+Goad, pushes the boundaries between architecture and technology, taking visitors on a virtual journey of 22 of Australia’s most intriguing unrealised architecture projects.

Augmented Australia showcases 11 historical and 11 contemporary projects from around the country designed over the past one hundred years that, for various reasons, were never built. Australia’s new pavilion in Venice by Denton Corker Marshall, currently under construction, also features in the unique exhibition.

Virtual 3D models, images, voiceovers and animations, activated by the specially designed Augmented Australia App, will bring the projects to life giving visitors a unique insight into the projects that could have been.

Visitors will be able to visit the free exhibition at Customs House and at selected sites around Sydney and Parramatta throughout the course of the exhibition. Customs House will feature trigger images of each project while real-world scale 3D models will be geographically positioned around the city and at Parramatta.

Varying in scale and typology, the projects include an alternative vision for Sydney Opera House and a Roman Catholic pilgrimage site in Western Australia.

Through the Augmented Australia App, which is free to download on common handheld devices, visitors will be able to experience these buildings as they were intended to be, including the spectacular 60 metre high ceilings and stained glass windows of Nervi’s unbuilt cathedral or sail through the in the centre of Harry Seidler’s 1952 design of the Melbourne Olympic Stadium in Sydney Harbour.

Philip Goad, a member of the curatorial team, and John Andrews, exhibition participant and architecture stalwart, will open the exhibition at a free evening event at Customs House on Thursday 30 October (RSVP essential to venice.biennale@architecture.com.au).

The exhibition has been curated for Sydney by locals Maja Brkic and Gianfranco Furlan and is exclusively sponsored by Austral Bricks.

Download the AugAusAustralia smartphone app from  iTunes  or Google Play.

For more information on Augmented Australia: architecture.com.au/venicebiennale
For more information on the Sydney Architecture Festival: sydneyarchitecturefestival.org