Actualizing the Vision with David Schunemann

Inside a darkened room, swirling bioluminescent textures, hyper-detailed 3D landscapes, glitched sacred geometry, and towering projection-mapped environments pulse in perfect synchronization with the music, transforming the stage into a living, digital organism powered by Actualize. Denver-based visual artist David Schunemann, known professionally as Actualize, has built a reputation for manually performing immersive visuals in real time using custom effects, projection mapping, and MIDI-controlled animation, bringing cinematic depth and intentional storytelling to artists like CloZee, LSDream, Of The Trees, and Ravenscoon. Alongside him, Glass Crane contributes an unmistakably surreal visual language rooted in psychedelic sculpture, cosmic architecture, and fluid dreamlike motion, creating imagery that feels equally inspired by visionary art galleries and underground rave culture. Together as Actual Crane, the pair blur the line between concert production and interactive art installation, crafting audiovisual experiences that feel less like a show and more like stepping inside a lucid dream.

Actualize lighting up The Caverns in Tennessee.

Denver’s visual underground is in full spotlight tomorrow, on May 28, at Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom as Actualize and Glass Crane present their collaborative audiovisual project rooted in Denver’s thriving art-forward electronic scene. Presented as a visual-centric experience built around projection mapping, immersive stage design, and community-driven creativity, the night pairs a secret music lineup with a stacked roster of visual artists including Papabear, LAIA, and Mind Balloon. The show arrives at a moment when Denver audiences  are increasingly excited about visuals being just as expressive as the music itself, a shift Actualize has helped shape through years of work alongside his contemporaries. Fresh off major productions at Red Rocks and national festival stages, Actualize brings that same large-scale cinematic energy back home to Cervantes with an all-new projection mapped stage and a night designed to spotlight the evolving relationship between music, visual art, and collective experience.

Ahead of this resounding evening, we had the chance to dive in with Schunemann about his recent experience at Red Rocks and what he’s got in store for this upcoming showcase.

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Alyssa: “We watched a lot about that Ravenscoon opening weekend at Red Rocks. How'd that feel?” 

Actualize: “Hell yeah. Oh, that was fun. Yeah, yeah, that was really cool.”

Alyssa: “What was special about doing the opening weekend?”

Actualize: “I mean, it was just really special in a lot of ways. I've known Paul for like a long time, Ravenscoon, so it was really cool to get to see him headline Red Rocks. Watching him grow from you know, playing much smaller venues to be able to do that. It's very inspiring and just cool to see. And I got to work with Jason Leech for the first time there, which was really fun. I got to work with Jared Oppenheim from The Gradient Perspective, and we've worked with him [in the past], like I met him almost 10 years ago now at Big Dub and he hired me to do visuals there. And so it was just a cool full circle moment because we don't get the opportunity to work together much. It was cool, but for Jason Leech it was really cool because I did something that I've never done at Red Rocks before, which was having the cameras be the central focus of the entire show. So, Jason Leech does all this live piano key stuff, so he wanted it all to be shown on the screens. He's like, "I want people to see what I'm doing the whole time." Another thing was Ravenscoon gave everybody um full access to all the LED walls, which was really, really cool.

So most of the time, you know, when you're an opener or working with a support act at Red Rocks, you only get you know, like a portion of the LED wall, like a small little piece and then for the headliner there's way more LED wall and it's bigger and epic, much more epic. For this show, they let everyone use all of it. So even during Jason Leech's set, it looked like a headliner set. We had everything but lasers and pyro, you know, (Laughter) so it looked really good. And that was just really fun because there was so much extra LED wall. And doing opening weekend at Red Rocks is always really fun. I feel like I end up there pretty often actually. Last year it was the Icelandic Winter on the Rocks or something, and it was like early March. It was even earlier than this show. I was there with Zingara and we were supporting Gramatik. And then the season before that, I think I did the last show with Of The Trees. So I often end up like on the last or the first show, or both.”

Alyssa: “You just mentioned that you were doing more directed content towards these individual producers, individual artist shows. Have you felt new-found pressures and new-found challenges, being the person that they trust with their vision for the show?

Actualize: “Definitely. It feels very cool to be respected enough to have my opinion matter to people like that, you know. I'm really grateful to work with all these people, and it's really cool that they do trust me with their vision and it's a very collaborative process. We work together closely to make sure that it is their vision. Like for Zingara, we just did this massive content project for her Parallel Spirits tour, which was the co-headline with Level Up, and we really went in on that project. She had a whole ton of ideas of things she wanted to make. And another thing that's new, [this new] software that I use a lot with these kinds of teams and artists, is ShowControl, which essentially gives you the ability to run timecode so that you can build out essentially a full music video that's synced to a track. So when they play that track on the CDJs, it will trigger the video and stay in sync the entire time.”

Alyssa: “That's so interesting. So tell me more about this Actual Crane show. Where did you find inspiration for that?”

Actualize: “So basically it all started with the first visual-centric Cervantes show on the Other Side, which was just kind of just to test the waters and see if an event like this could work. And um— yeah. It worked. It worked really well and it was cool because we didn't have to announce any music at all and we just announced a VJ lineup. I mean the flyer design was pretty cool too.”

Alyssa: “It's so cool that the visual side has become a more concrete and integrated part of shows. People have come to expect a certain level of curation.” 

Schunemann at work in Meow Wolf Denver.

Actualize: “I absolutely think that these events that we're throwing could like, you know, if we promote it properly and we really put a lot of time and energy into making these events special and different and unique, I think that we have the opportunity to go far with these types of events. I think like doing something that or even, you know, even being able to do Cervantes' Ballroom is like really, really cool to be able to do something like this, but being able to do it on a larger scale where people who are less familiar with it will hear about it. I think it would just be cool to be able to make that kind of impact. It would be a big win for visual artists everywhere.”

Alyssa: “Do you think the people in Denver are interested or up for this type of thing, specifically around VJs?”

Actualize: “Oh yeah. I honestly think so. More here than other places. Because here it's like people really have a focus not only on the show, but the visuals because like you said, it's at every show, it's expected and there's shows every night of the week of every size. It's like a new renaissance, you know. I feel like because these art forms are relatively new and unexplored, when it comes to visuals, stuff that's specifically made to just pair with music and are cool to look at, so when something is unique and different visually, they notice.”

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As Denver continues to charge into this new renaissance of audiovisual integration, the May 28 Actual Crane show at Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom will no doubt be one of the most uniquely fun events of the year. shifting the spotlight toward the screen and the stage design. Actualize and Glass Crane are not just providing entertainment, they are validating the visual artist as a cornerstone of the live experience. Whether you are a dedicated fan of the underground or a newcomer to the scene, Actual Crane promises to be a masterclass in design. Don't miss the chance to witness this evolution firsthand in the heart of Denver's thriving electronic scene.

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