Cultural engineering and technological innovation

ACCIONA Producciones y Diseño is a company dedicated to carrying out actions that use technology and sustainable development to bring culture closer to a mass audience.

Cultural Engineering refers to the design of overall strategies in which culture takes on the leading role in leisure, tourism and individual and social wellbeing.

It's a discipline that is relatively little known in Spain; even so ACCIONA Producciones y Diseño (formerly GPD) today stands as a pioneering force in this type of ground-breaking solutions capable of bringing a new lease of life to otherwise flagging places and spaces. And it does so by bringing culture, history and local traditions to the fore.

APD delivers products designed specifically to draw the crowds in a fun, social and educational way, and by applying sustainability principles and technological innovation at all times. These solutions can be applied to a variety of spheres, e.g. history, art, heritage and even sports and music.

Moreover they usually take the shape of a temporary or permanent event, or even a combination of both, using multiple formats: light and sound shows, multimedia, audiovisual guided tours, interactive installations, and so on.

APD put together a breathtaking 3D spectacular to mark the 2013 Champions League Final 2013, in London

Champions League 2013

A prime example of this vision as applied to sports took the shape of an audiovisual show held in London's Trafalgar Square, in the run-up to the 2013 Champions League soccer final. The multimedia event projected 3D images highlighting some of the standout moments in the history of this European soccer tournament which goes back to 1955, including tribute to the Cup's legends and champions. The event called for a special structure, featuring a 200 square-meter-plus screen that imitated the surface of a stretched-out soccer ball. ACCIONA put all of its cutting-edge visual and sensory tech clout into this spectacular, turning into a showcase for history, tradition and values; in this case, those of the governing body of football in Europe, UEFA.

Zurbaran's saintly women

The art world provided the setting for another flagship event based on this concept. The acclaimed "Santas de Zurbarán" (Zurbaran's Saintly Women) exhibition, opened last May in the Santa Clara Exhibition Space, in Seville (southern Spain), brings together some of the most beautiful paintings of female saints, painted by Spanish Golden Age artist Francisco de Zurbaran, with works from the world's major museums, such as London's National Gallery or Madrid's Prado and Thyssen museums. The show also features dresses by Spanish designers which draw their inspiration from the canvasses of the painter from Fuente de Cantos (Badajoz, southeast Spain).