Sanctuary
Sanctuary is an immersive art installation that weaves emerging immersive media (virtual reality, augmented reality, and depth sensing cameras) with physical space and traditional media (audio recordings and 2D film). It was created as a unique experimental experience that explores the relationship of physical and metaphorical space to personal truth. Sanctuary was created by Dane Christensen and Carol Dalrymple and premiered at the 2019 Damn These Heels LGBTQ Film Festival in Salt Lake City.
Dane Christensen is an immersive media documentary filmmaker who specializes in interactive storytelling with emerging mediums. Dane received his MFA in Documentary Film from Stanford University.
Carol Dalrymple is an Emmy-award winning filmmaker whose work explores stories that change our perception of the world. As an Oculus fellow, Carol uses virtual and augmented reality to explore new dimensions of immersive and interactive storytelling.
Dane and Carol make up the Interspace Collective which has a mission of connecting people in new ways to the world, ideas and each other by exploring the intersectionality of evolving immersive mediums and the physical world.
The Pieces
Sanctuary has four immersive pieces:
Savannah (360 Video) took a stand and told her ward that God didn’t make a mistake on her. She knows happiness means being exactly who she is meant to be.
Marylu & Lauralie (2D film in VR headset) live together and are active in their local LDS ward. For them, faith is just as important as who they are. Their way forward isn’t choosing one or the other, but finding a way to be authentic to themselves — and to their faith.
Judith (Audio experience with interactive VR painting) spent her career as a painter for her church — each painting felt divinely inspired — yet remained in the closet most of her life. She risked it all by coming out, but felt compelled to use her authentic voice.
Jenny (Audio experience with interactive physical and hologram installation) struggled to find herself because she couldn’t embrace her truest self. When she was able to live her truth as a transwoman, it meant losing her marriage, family, career and community.
The Space
The space was set up into three sections divided by white curtains. The main section had wooden church pews made to resemble a chapel. At the front of the pews stood a large mirror, suggesting a theme of reflection and how others perceive you. In this space, participants viewed the pieces Savannah and Marylu & Lauralie. Once they had viewed these pieces, they could sit and reflect about their truths in the makeshift chapel.
The two other sections were behind the makeshift chapel space. In the one section, the space was decorated as an art studio with physical brushes, paints and canvases. Participants listened to Judith while painting in VR. In this experience, participants paint alongside a specially created piece of virtually created art by Judith. For Judith, she connects to her spirituality through her art and we wanted the audience to have a spiritual experience in this virtual space created for the exhibit’s physical space.
The third section is where participants listened to Jenny. This section was decorated with a large vanity mirror and clothing racks. In a picture frame next to the mirror, participants saw a real-time hologram of themselves. While listening to Jenny’s story, participants were encouraged to try on the different articles of clothing.
The inspiration for designing Sanctuary as an iteration on the spaces we go to cultivate our personal truths. The main chapel section was designed to mimic the scene in the Savannah VR piece where the viewer is in a church chapel. By providing physical church pews to sit in, the intention was to emphasize the meaning of physical space and metaphorical space for our personal truths.
As a participant entered the installation, they were able to sit in a pew and pick up a paper resembling a church bulletin. The cover of the bulletin had this description:
Who are you? What are your personal truths? How do you express them?
Sanctuary is a safe space where we encourage you to reflect on what makes you, you.
Through immersive media, you’ll be able to experience the stories of four individuals, each on a journey to find their truest self. The spaces that hold the expression of our identities are our personal sanctuaries. They must be held sacred.
The inner portion of the bulletin had synopses of the VR pieces. Once a participant had read through the bulletin, they would contact the installation volunteer about which pieces they wanted to see. The volunteer would outfit the participant with a headset and start the requested program.
Feedback
The installation ran more or less smoothly as we were using Showtime VR to run group showings of pieces. Additionally we had sideloaded Savannah and Marylu & Lauralie onto the headsets in case we needed to play them manually — which did happen several times. The flow of setting up participants with headsets, playing the pieces and charging the headsets ran relatively smoothly with a few bottleneck periods. Having a backup playback solution was crucial in these moments in order to accommodate all participants. For future installations, we strongly recommend having concrete screening times where participants must sign up.
Immersive art installations of mixed media experiment with how creating a physical space and different immersive experiences on the same subject lead to deeper audience engagement. We wanted to see how the intersection of physical, emotional and metaphorical would encourage deeper reflection and connection with the stories presented in the installation. The physical spaces were designed to provide moments of pause and self-reflection as the participant moved through the experiences in the installation.
One particular story stands out to us about a woman who watched Savannah and then listened to Judith while VR painting. She said she broke down watching Savannah because she had tried to take her life in a church chapel when she was the same age as Savannah. The Savannah piece made her re-experience this trauma. But as she painted in VR while listening to Judith, she expressed that it was healing to listen to a story of an artist becoming one with her identity and creating art. We are moved that the installation provided deeply personal experiences for this participant and others.
For more descriptions about the Sanctuary installation, check out these links.
Sanctuary was made possible by generous support from the Utah Film Center and Edge of Discovery. We want to thank you our partners, friends and family who helped make this installation possible. It was a time-consuming creative process that evolved beyond what we had envisioned.
