DUBAI – Global tourism has taken an unprecedented hit in the past two years, but as the promise of a post-pandemic world begins to seem like a viable reality, one of Europe’s most popular music festivals, EXIT, is offering to virtually whisk Expo 2020 Dubai visitors to Novi Sad via a new experience at the Serbia Pavilion.
Visitors to the pavilion can strap on a virtual-reality headset to be taken into the heart of EXIT, a two-time winner of the Best Major European Festival Award, ahead of its 2022 edition at the Petrovaradin Fortress in Novi Sad from 7-10 July. The line-up includes the likes of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, with more names to be announced soon.
The VR experience takes visitors through eight immersive scenes filmed at last year’s EXIT, from the excitement of nearing the festival site at Varadin Bridge on the Danube, through to seeing David Guetta perform at the main stage. There are also several other perspectives across venues within the spectacular 17th-century fortress.
Throughout the journey – filmed with an 8k 360 VR camera, as EXIT became the first major festival to take place since the beginning of the pandemic – you are accompanied by a group of fashionable friends, who interact and talk to the camera, enthusiastically encouraging you to join them on each step of the experience.
Ivan Paestka, Resident Manager, Serbia Pavilion, said: “The fortress is a unique space for this type of event, so while you’re at EXIT Festival, as you can see from the virtual reality, you’re going through the fortress and you experience different stages, while you’re surrounded by the history. You feel like you are there, either on the bridge or in the fortress or on the stage with David Guetta – it feels so realistic, so you don’t have [the] feeling you are in the [Serbia] Pavilion.
“We are hoping to attract people via virtual reality in a way where this realistic picture that they see will attract them to explore more about Serbia. This is not the only fortress we have; this is not the only city we have; this is not the only music festival we have – but it’s a perfect glimpse of what we can offer as a tourism destination, and maybe even for people to establish their businesses there. Serbia, Belgrade, Novi Sad are definitely very touristic destinations where we’re expecting tourism to generate more gross domestic product in that field.”
Vladimir Sukovic, VR Support on the project, said: “In our pavilion, we have different VR exhibitions – art museums and art galleries from Belgrade in Serbia, and of course we have EXIT.
“I think it’s very important for the EXIT Festival. Lots of people, because of COVID-19, they don’t have the opportunity to come to Novi Sad [since the start of the pandemic]. When they come to our pavilion and see the presentation of the festival, lots of people told us, ‘it was like I was there.’”
In addition to allowing music-lovers to preview the excitement of a festival in another country without leaving Expo 2020 Dubai, the multitude of uses for virtual reality are constantly evolving, Sukovic said: “Right now, it’s very important how to connect NFTs [Non-fungible tokens] with VR systems … Hopefully, with the help of the Serbia Pavilion, we will have the opportunity at the Expo to promote it as a project. In the next few years, we’ll see how [virtual reality will also] connect with the metaverse, to make new products.”
The Serbia Pavilion, located in the Mobility District, is fully digitised and can be visited virtually. Innovative VR technology introduces visitors to 7,000 years of Vinča culture and Serbian greats such as Nikola Tesla, Mihajlo Pupin, and Milutin Milanković. In addition to VR, millions of visitors from all over the world will be able to explore the greatest treasures of Serbia’s national museums, technological innovations and tourism.