Editorial⎪In the midst of advanced XR technologies, old-school tech interactives can still pack a punch

An AI-generated trans drag show, a dystopian game about digital “security” and an almost pornographic immersive VR piece about gay saunas in Taiwan. These were some of the pieces at the recent CPH:DOX interactive program, where vulnerability and marginalized narratives emerged as a theme.

There were experiments with the latest technologies, like using Minecraft to catalog and release invisible archives from behind the walls of authoritative regimes. But three of the narrative pieces that had the most power to channel vulnerability and bring the viewer in a “dialogue” with other voices were actually the pieces leaning more old-school in their technologies.

Be sure to catch up on our previous coverage of the CPH:Lab 2022-2023:

• ZEDNA, UNSTABLE EVIDENCE, SLIPSTREAMING (part 1)
• COLLATERAL ECHOES VR, THE FOREST THAT BREATHES US, DIPLOMATIC REBEL (part 2)
• NËPP NËPPËL, GHOST GENES, BABEL (part 3)

HE FUCKED THE GIRL OUT OF ME, Blacktransarchive.com/WE ARE HERE BECAUSE OF THOSE THAT ARE NOT and AS MINE EXACTLY were three pieces that use older technologies and in-the-room interactivity to engage on one-on-one levels.

Old can be just as good

With the first two pieces, old video game engines offer a visual landscape that is a departure from the more ubiquitous “digital art” design of many XR pieces. HE FUCKED THE GIRL OUT OF ME – a semi-autobiographical tale of trans sex work and trauma by Taylor McCue – is literally 1989-era Nintendo game boy technology, limited to four colors and certain character movements. The viewer/player is invited to step into the journey of “Ann” using handset buttons to advance the narrative text and move through the experience. McCue gives choices to select in certain situations and sometimes traps the viewer/player in movements that evoke the feelings of that moment before releasing them to advance. The simple digital aesthetic reflects the “rawness” of the experience, but also made it possible for McCue to actually complete the emotionally exhausting piece. “The reason I chose that format is frankly, writing about that shit was really upsetting,” McCue says. “So I couldn’t do a more complicated computer programming thing.”

Blacktransarchive.com/WE ARE HERE BECAUSE OF THOSE THAT ARE NOT, by Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley, deploys similar 1980’s/90’s gaming technology to center the black trans archive, release its stories and invite the viewer/player to identify with or be an ally to the black trans community and history. The early 90s colors, graphics and large, simple text on screen challenges, invites and almost assaults one to go on this journey. At the opening, you are prompted to identify whether you are “Black and Trans,” “Trans” or “Cis”, your selection sending you off on different threads through the archive, further choices continuously arising. Can we lie? Sure, in fact Brathwaite-Shirley gives permission, because the game is designed to be reflective and reflexive. “I want people to be responsible for the stories they’re told,” Brathwaite-Shirley says. “Game engines traditionally don’t allow that, don’t get that kind of conversion of thought.” By modding, the artist can get people to engage better.

Both these interactive works use game engines to incentivize people to “do something”, to accompany the artists on a journey and also be self-reflexive and accountable in their choices.

If McCue’s piece brings the viewer close to an autobiographical experience, Charlie Shackleton’s AS MINE EXACTLY invites the viewer to bear witness together with him. Unlike many VR pieces that push empathy by attempting to put you in someone’s shoes, the headset here serves more as a way of centering the participant in the moment, affording intimacy and focus as part-desktop documentary/part-live performance unfolds. Shackleton and his mother revisit the medical emergency (seizure) that reshaped their lives, recounting fragments of the past through photos, testimonies and actual video taken by the childhood Shackleton himself. It is a haunting and moving portrait of family and resilience, and for many viewers probably unearths feelings about something similar in their own lives.

“Merging the experimental and intimate format of VR with a story to tell in a personal way” – Charlie Shackleton (AS MINE EXACTLY)

Shackleton has put thought into every choice in this piece, and the choice to not use the most up-to-date advanced headset or full 360 or other forms of immersive buildouts was intentional: to keep the viewer present with him. The original Quest headset is lighter and less cumbersome than more modern gear, allowing the viewer to relax more easily into the experience. He chooses to have the work be only 180 (and barely that, almost entirely unfolding as a screen in front of your eyes) so the focus stays on his voice and the experience happening between what ends up being two “participants” in the narrative. While it might not seem that the viewer is being asked to do something, they in fact are: to perform active listening.

Immersive doesn’t need to be private

One of the criticisms of immersive art work is that it can be a solitary experience navigated in a headset. At CPH:DOX, HE FUCKED THE GIRL OUT OF ME and Blacktransarchive.com/WE ARE HERE BECAUSE OF THOSE THAT ARE NOT were installed in a public, open space and AS MINE EXACTLY is a live, shared performance.

Does the “liveness” here make a difference? The two game pieces can be played online, but the experience of engaging with them in a public space adds a different level.

HE FUCKED THE GIRL OUT OF ME wasn’t intended to be exhibited in a live setting. It’s very sensitive content, and it could be scary for McCue to experience or watch other people engage with it. But it is interesting how people may or may not watch over or interact with someone playing. For instance, at a recent gaming conference, McCue witnessed a group of “dude bros” from a South Park booth across from the piece “daring each other to play the game”.

Where that piece’s installation was more single chair/small television, Blacktransarchive.com/WE ARE HERE BECAUSE OF THOSE THAT ARE NOT draws more attention with a large projection screen and console with three large interactive buttons. It’s almost impossible to not watch someone playing. Brathwaite-Shirley likes when it engages people and has seen audiences “check” or respond to the choices a player was making, sometimes cheering them on, sometimes criticizing them for not telling the truth. The act of playing becomes a performance in itself.

AS MINE EXACTLY is of course the epitome of “liveness”. It’s designed as an in-person performance only, Shackleton consciously making the choice to not have a film or online version of it.

Despite, or perhaps because of, more old-school technologies, viewers are participating in keeping very personal experiences alive through these pieces. In joining the journeys, they bear witness and solidarity with trauma but also survival.