The phenomena of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) has brought into focus the maturation of a number of technologies, including the production of immersive digital environments, the hardware and software needed to render these virtual environments in real-time, and an accompanying optical device (usually in the form of a headset) that is neither physically constricting nor overly cumbersome. As an extension of the history of optical devices, from the static capture of the camera to the successive images of film, VR/AR extends the still image into a seamless, 360-degree immersive environment.
Distinctive in the way it spatially engages the participant actor, VR/AR conceives fully realized worlds or overlays creations upon the physical world. While virtual environments must be created, and are therefore limited in their bounds, the participant actor is able to focus and move through the space freely within those bounds. No longer tied to the single, fixed vantage point of the camera, VR/AR enables an interactive engagement with the constructed environment allowing for an experiential simultaneity of multiple, dynamic vantage points in one instance. While virtual environments must be created, and are therefore limited in their bounds, the participant actor is able to focus and move through the space freely within those bounds.
The theater project attempts to physically reference the simultaneous experiential view of multiple, dynamic vantage points viewed in a single instance; each of the three theaters contains a physical, visual connection to its adjoining theaters from the viewpoint of the participant actor. The visual connection to adjoining theater spaces is persistent, direct and tied to the orientation of the participant actor. Physical restrictions and current limitations of virtual reality present themselves as opportunities and emphasize the real, social implications of the body in space; the realization of physical bodies in motion highlights the design as social theater. Diagrammatically, the line of circulation and the human scope of vision tie together the three disparate spaces of theater, black box and outside amphitheater.
