For its third edition, Embodied Realms is returning to Poznań this October with an ambition that increasingly goes beyond presenting immersive works. Alongside its artistic programme, the Polish event is expanding its industry activities to connect creators, producers, researchers, students, institutions and companies around a still emerging national XR ecosystem.
Organised by the Virtual Horizons Foundation, Embodied Realms was initially developed around the intersection of performance and immersive technologies. Its 2026 edition continues this exploration while broadening the conversation: from artistic creation and storytelling to education, heritage, research, healthcare and professional applications of XR. The industry programme will notably include a two-day conference, workshops, portfolio presentations, project showcases and mentoring. Creative Europe Desk Poland is co-organising the industry event.
The approach reflects a wider question for the Polish immersive sector. While Poland has a substantial audiovisual, technology and creative talent base, XR production remains relatively fragmented, with limited dedicated financing and few regular opportunities for creators to meet across disciplines.
Cover: Embodied Realms 2025
Festival director Joanne Popińska sees Embodied Realms as one possible meeting point between these communities. The challenge is not simply to showcase existing projects, but to make immersive creation more visible locally and give emerging creators a clearer understanding of where their skills can be applied. As she explained during our conversation, interest already exists: even during the festival’s first edition, workshops attracted participants travelling from Warsaw, Kraków and Wrocław to Poznań.
2026 Line-Up
- COLLECTIVE BODY (Sarah Silverblatt-Buser – See our interview)
- REPLICA (Kerryn Wise)
- PROXEMIX (Patryk Lichota)
- A LONG GOODBYE (Kate Voet, Victor Maes – See our interview)
- MIRAGE (Naima Karim)
- SENSE OF NOWHERE (Hsin-Hsuan Yeh)
- ORIGEN (Emilia Sánchez Chiquetti)
- THE EYE AND I (Jean-Michel Jarre, Hsin-Chien Huang – See our interview)
- TRUMNA VR (Patryk Lichota)
- Taiwan x Embodied / THEATRE IN THE BRAIN
- Taiwan x Embodied / THE DRIFTER
- Taiwan x Embodied / DISPLACED DWELLING: ABSENCE
- Taiwan x Embodied / THE REALM OF VICTORIA
From immersive art to a broader XR conversation
This year’s conference makes that cross-sector approach particularly explicit. Sessions will address art and new forms of storytelling, education and heritage, production and financing, academic research, XR in healthcare, as well as practical business applications. Rather than separating cultural XR from more utilitarian uses of immersive technologies, Embodied Realms wants to bring these communities into the same room.
For Popińska, this circulation of knowledge also addresses a practical issue for emerging creators. Developing an artistic XR practice does not necessarily mean relying exclusively on cultural commissions. Skills acquired through immersive production can also be applied to training, education, research, healthcare or industrial projects, allowing creators and technologists to remain within the broader XR field while diversifying their activities.
The programme reflects that philosophy through practical formats. Displace Studio, the team behind REPLICA, will lead a workshop on volumetric capture and the relationship between physical performers and their digital doubles. A second workshop organised with the Polish-Japanese Academy of Information Technology (PJATK) will introduce participants to TouchDesigner and the creation of interactive visual environments. Both workshops are free, with applications open until October 4.
Creating entry points for new Polish talent
The third edition also reinforces formats designed less around finished works than around people and projects still finding their place in the ecosystem.
Portfolio presentations will give a creative producer and a creative technologist fifteen minutes to introduce their work and professional practice to the industry audience. Meanwhile, Bring Your Own XR will welcome projects at different stages of development, from early prototypes and works in progress to completed experiences. Artistic projects can sit alongside initiatives developed for education, science, culture, medicine or business.
A mentoring component extends the initiative beyond the festival itself. One project presented through Bring Your Own XR will be selected for individual support after the event, with mentors including Laetitia Bochud, President of XR4Europe and Head of the IMPULSE Programme, Michael Barngrover, Managing Director of XR4Europe, as well as Popińska and producer and creator Tom C. Hall. Depending on the project, the mentoring may address concept development, production, technology, presentation strategy or opportunities for future collaboration and distribution.
This emphasis on early-stage creators also connects with another part of the festival’s mission: education. Embodied Realms reserves dedicated exhibition periods for schools and universities, introducing students to immersive works through guided visits. For an ecosystem where relatively few pathways into XR are currently visible, building familiarity with the medium is as important as supporting projects already in production.
Making Poznań a meeting point for immersive creation
The artistic programme remains central to the identity of Embodied Realms, particularly its interest in the relationship between immersive technology and live performance. This year’s selection includes works combining VR with dancers and performers alongside a more traditional exhibition programme, as well as collaborations with Taiwanese creators and PJATK.
These formats remain difficult to tour. Bringing performers, technical teams and dedicated equipment considerably increases presentation costs, a constraint that limits the circulation of immersive theatre and dance internationally. Popińska nevertheless sees an opportunity for Poznań, a city with an established performing arts culture, to progressively create a home for this type of work.
That development will take time. Embodied Realms is still a young event operating within an ecosystem where dedicated financing and institutional support for immersive creation remain limited. But its third edition suggests a useful direction: connecting audiences, students and creators while simultaneously building relationships with research, education, healthcare and business.
For Poland, the objective is therefore not simply to add another XR festival to the European calendar. It is to create more opportunities for people already interested in immersive technologies to meet, develop skills, test projects and identify possible collaborators — and, gradually, to give a dispersed community a place where an ecosystem can begin to take shape.
