XR brings together virtual, augmented and mixed reality to create a blended reality in which data seamlessly mingles with the physical environment. 

The impact of this new integrated world is becoming evident across society in domains such as education, health care, industry and culture. Inevitably, the opportunities XR presents also introduce critical issues relating to sustainability, ethics, data privacy, and unequal access to technology, to name a few examples. 

XR tools offer creatives and artists compelling possibilities for building upon and challenging existing modes of content creation and storytelling while helping to develop original methodologies for producing new artistic media.

The XR Matinee, organised by V2_Lab for the Unstable Media on September 202th 2024 is part of Realities in Transition. It was an afternoon full of presentations on extended reality with:

Ágnes Karolina Bakk, the head and lead researcher of Immersion and Interaction Hub at the Innovation Center of Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, Budapest. Ágnes Karolina Bakk is also a narrative designer focusing on immersive theatrical formats, immersive storytelling & the science of magic. She currently leads research projects on romantic relationships in Metaverse-like environments and on psychological restoration in a nature-simulation VR and its clinical use. She is the founder of the Zip-Scene conference that is running since 2018 in Budapest and Prague, and cofounder of Random Error Studio which focuses on creation of VR productions. She is also the co-curator of Vektor VR section, Hungary’s first VR-focused event. She teaches immersive storytelling, and speculative design and offers talks at various conferences from Kobe (JP) to Montreal (CA) including festivals (Stereopsia, DokLeipzig). She is also a narrative designer for several video games. She co-edited the book Designing Immersive Environments – Enchanting Spaces, together with Péter Kristóf Makai, which will be published in October 2024 by Palgrave Macmillan.

Maria Engberg, an Associate Professor / Reader of Media Technology at Malmö University. Her research interests include emerging media technologies (eg. Virtual, Mixed and Augmented Reality), digital reading practices, digital writing and aesthetics, and multisensory media. Recent publications include the edited volume The Digital Reading Condition (2023, Routledge, with Iben Have and Birgitte Stougaard Pedersen), Reality Media: Augmented and Virtual Reality (2021, MIT Press, with Jay David Bolter and Blair MacIntyre). Engberg holds a Ph.D. in English from Uppsala University (2007).

Joris Weijdom, a researcher and designer of extended-reality (XR) experiences focusing on interdisciplinary creative processes and performativity. He designs site-specific performative mixed-reality installations and functions as a technical dramaturge in other artistic and applied design projects. As an experienced speaker, he talks about embodiment, immersion, and presence in performative mixed-reality experience design. Working as an associate professor at the HKU University of the Arts Utrecht, he leads the HKU Artistic Extended Reality Lab and teaches several BA and MA courses. His PhD project develops the performative prototyping methodology using embodied design techniques in collaborative mixed reality environments to create novel experiences for/through XR in professional and educational settings in collaboration with the University of Twente.

This event was organised in the frame of [Up]Loaded Bodies, an exhibition that explores the horizon between the virtual and the real, the bodies and their materiality.