Audiovisual exhibition of the Museum San Telmo pays tribute to the clandestine network Comet

Comet, the clandestine network that operated during World War II, is the protagonist of the audiovisual and interactive installation, composed of 32 screens and produced by Morgancrea, which is exhibited in the San Telmo Museum in Donostia.

The past 17 March San Telmo Museum of Donostia inaugurated the interactive exposure ‘Comet, The Network of Evasion, an exhibition dedicated to the Franco-Belgian clandestine organization (1941-44) which was dedicated to hosting and repatriating Allied airmen who were shot down in Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II.

It is an audiovisual and interactive project, which will remain open until 31 May in the Museum's Laboratory Room, with free entry, and?, coinciding with the 70 anniversary of the end of World War II, seeks to pay tribute to all those who made up the civil organization Comète, as well as survivors and family members.

The escape route began in Brussels and, after passing through cities like Paris, Bordeaux or Bayonne, reached the Basque Country, where the fugitives crossed the border into Spain along the Bidasoa River or the Pyrenees. Once in San Sebastian, The services of the British or Belgian embassies took charge of the aviators and they were taken to Gibraltar to be repatriated back to Great Britain..

More than 3.000 civilians from various countries, with a very prominent role of women, who managed to welcome or repatriate some 800 fugitives, most allied airmen.

The exhibition is a collaboration between the San Telmo Museum, the House of Peace and Human Rights and Donostia 2016, and shows a journey through the eight stations that correspond to the route of the European map made by the Comète network: London, Brussels, Paris, Bordeaux, Dax, Bayonne, Badass, Pyrenees, Gipuby and Gibral.

To show all this history, an audiovisual frieze consisting of 32 monitors, some of them interactive, which recalls the trail of a comet and where testimonies from the time are recalled.

These images are the ones that were left out of the documentary presented in 2011 The Last Passage, for which research work was carried out that lasted five years and whose production has been carried out by Morgancrea from archival materials from Moztu Filmak.

Among the 32 monitors, 24 screens offer information, images, documents and testimonies on the Comet network of synchronized form. This allows you to create audiovisual games that run simultaneously on all monitors., like the passing of planes, the route of a train or writing text on all screens.

To carry out this installation, we have used 8 Mac Mini computers with output to 3 monitors. The control system, scheduling and synchronization has been created using QLab, a Show Control application for Mac developed by Figure53.

In addition, 8 touch and interactive screens house nearly 200 videos in which you can see and hear interviews with thirty protagonists or relatives of people involved in the network.

They are also We have opted for tablets ViewSonic VSD221 22 inches, that work on Android OS, with an HTML5 interface developed by the company Hamaikaweb, which has allowed the interviews to be electronically subtitled in 4 languages (Basque, castellano, French, English) user selectable.

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