Overview

This is a collaborative project I created with Alice Grishchenko, who is interested in interactive media and user-driven narrative. As a mutual interest in surrealist artwork, we agreed to create an interactive environment based on MC Escher’s Relativity lithograph and experiment with ways interactive media and mechanics could reflect concepts suggested in artwork. This image portrays themes of multiple perspectives and a consideration of an individual’s surroundings in their specific orientation in the world.

We wanted to provide a participant with the ability to actually explore those different perspectives and see what the world looked like from different orientations. Using Unity 3D and the Oculus, we made a space out of a pre-modeled replication of Escher’s complex construction. There is a mini-game within the environment that allows for look-driven aiming mechanics to identify one's orientation in the world based on Escher's image.

There is also an exterior aspect, where all archways leading outdoors in the image transport the user to a unified natural terrain that represents an individual’s internal mind and thoughts. Through exploring this symbolic space, they can find another archway and lead back into the Escher interior with a new perspective, orientation, and consideration.