Project Description

KUENSTNER – Expanding Realities at Airbeat One Festival 2025

For the 2025 edition of the legendary Airbeat One Festival in Germany, KUENSTNER was once again proud to deliver high-impact visual experiences that redefined the connection between stage and screen. As the creative and technical partner for media server operating, VJing, and media design on the Mainstage, as well as content creators for the Hardstyle Stage, we set out to transform physical set elements into immersive visual environments—focusing heavily on naked eye effects that pushed the limits of what’s possible in live show design.

Mainstage – Where Illusion Meets Architecture

This year’s Mainstage was an architectural marvel designed and crafted by genius minds of GoPlus1—and our goal was to extend its physical presence using digital illusion. Our focus was on creating naked eye effects: carefully crafted 3D visuals designed to appear as if they were real, physical extensions of the stage when viewed by the audience.

Using perspective-corrected media, depth simulation, and hyper-realistic lighting, we turned the LED walls into visual portals—openings into new dimensions that changed the perceived structure of the stage in real time. These effects made the audience feel as though the stage was warping, unfolding, or expanding before their eyes.

The visual language evolved throughout the festival, shifting with the energy of each performance. Our live VJing team drove these effects in sync with the music—ensuring that every drop, rise, and breakdown was met with a moment of visual surprise. With every beat, the architecture felt alive.

Media Server Operating

To bring these effects to life, we relied on high end servers from XI.Mashines running resolute Arena to ensure frame-perfect playback, real-time control, and flawless integration across an enormous LED setup. This technical backbone allowed us to map content to the physical contours of the stage, achieving the illusion of depth, scale, and realism without the use of AR or glasses—just pure, raw illusion visible to the naked eye.

Hardstyle Stage – The Eyes of the Bull

In addition to the Mainstage, we were also tasked with a very special challenge: creating custom visual content for the Hardstyle Stage, which featured a massive bull as its central scenic element.

Our focus? The eyes.

We designed and animated the bull’s eyes to be reactive and expressive—ranging from intense stares and glows during high-energy sections, to subtle eye movements that gave the entire stage a sense of awareness and presence. The eyes became a central emotional point of the stage, locking in with the crowd and amplifying the intensity of the Hardstyle sets.

A Shared Vision

This project was a massive team effort and couldn’t have been achieved without close coordination between visual designers, technical teams, and production. Thanks to all disciplines like SFX from FOG, Laser from Laserfrabrik and Lighting Design by Chris Rostalski. Our design process was rooted in storytelling through visuals, always thinking about how each element—from Mainstage illusions to the Hardstyle bull—would feel from the audience perspective. The goal: maximum impact with minimal separation between screen and structure.

Until next year, stay bold.

Project Details

  • Client

    Musik Eggert

  • Skills

    • Mediadesign
    • VJing and Operating
    • Showdesign