Sundance VR: 5 Noteworthy Projects at New Frontier
19 Jan, 2017
From live-action VR, immersive experiences, technology and art installations, this season’s New Frontier at Sundance 2017 brings us 5 noteworthy projects not to be missed.
If Not Love
Artists/Directed by Rose Troche
Forcing the viewer-participant to engage and ponder difficult subject matter like a mass shooting at a nightclub as a result of a man’s feelings of shame, Rose Troche’s IF NOT LOVE pushes the viewer to ponder questions like—after the intimate encounter with another man, “what if events unfolded differently? What if the man he hooked up with convinced him to stay—to face himself? Could that simple act have changed the course of history?”
NeuroSpeculative AfroFeminism
Artists/Directed by Ashley Baccus-Clark, Carmen Aguilar y Wedge, Ece Tankal, Nitzan Bartov
Enter Brook’s Salon, a beauty salon of the future, and peruse a line of speculative low- to high-tech beauty products. transcranial extensions designed to make the brain’s synapses more excitable and primed to increase neuroplasticity. Participate in a live study on your way out to help Hyphen Labs better explore the neurocognitive impact of your visit.
Through YouArtists/Directed by Saschka Unseld, Lily Baldwin
This athletically vibrant and sensual experience explores love across a lifetime. Using dance to inhabit a common mortal story of love born, lived, lost, burned, and seemingly gone forever, Through You is a live-action VR richly infused with an atmosphere of passion. Dancers Joanna Kotze and Marni Thomas Wood, along with actor Amari Cheatom, take us through the coursing periods of time, from the 1970s to 2046 and beyond, where the question is harbored, “Can love be found again?”
The Sky Is a GapArtists/Directed by Rachel Rossin
This VR art installation enables you to precisely move time with space through the use of a custom made, positionally tracked headset. Manifesting in both the physical and virtual realms, Rossin’s installation depicts a pyroclastic explosion inspired by Zabriskie Point, where the progress of the explosive scene is physically mapped to the participant’s forward and backward movement.
[Top featured image: A still from The Sky Is a Gap by Rachel Rossin, an official selection of the New Frontier VR Experiences at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.]
Zero Days
Artists/Directed by Yasmin Elayat
This chilling documentary tells the story of the cyber weapon Stuxnet, a piece of self-replicating computer malware hatched during a clandestine mission by the U.S. and Israel to sabotage an underground Iranian nuclear facility. Told from the perspective of Stuxnet and a key NSA informant, the story places audiences inside the invisible world of computer viruses and allows them to experience the high stakes of cyber warfare.
About the author
Related Posts
-
The Best Films of Sundance 2022 (Part 2)
-
The Best Films of Sundance 2022 (Part 1)
-
Spotlight on Venice VR Expanded | Biennale Cinema 2021
-
Sundance, SXSW-winning Director Jim Cummings on Filmmaking
-
Sundance Institute Boasts Record Numbers for 2021 Festival
-
Sundance: Apple Acquires CODA, Netflix Snags PASSING
-
Costume Designer Phoenix Mellow on designing for films
-
From Art Basel Miami to Hong Kong Online Viewing Rooms
-
Hillary Clinton discusses her 'Hillary' Hulu docu-series
-
INTERVIEW: Celebrity Hair Stylist Carla Farmer