
INTERIOR STROLL (2016)
Interior Stroll is an interactive installation designed to collapse physical space and memory space, body and consciousness. More walking meditation than walking simulation, it is set in a symbolic cavespace shaped by the psychic runoff from years of malignant intimacy. It is navigated with two modified personal pleasure commodities, and it wants you to go deeper, but not too deep.
As a “developer” with a robust experimental media background and no investment in traditional video game dynamics and conventions, my interest in 3D modeling and interactive tools lies in their ability to combine cinema’s time-based magical realism with gaming’s demands on movement and reaction time. This piece is about how the body stores memory and the mind processes trauma, and how they can coalesce as a means to communicate what might otherwise be unspeakable. I wanted to create a terrain where consciousness acts on the body and where anatomy bleeds into the imagination—where Fantastic Voyage meets The Cell.
My other objective was to consider the peripherals — i.e., controllers — as both an extension of the digital environment and in terms of their potential act on the user (as the user acts on them). I used existing controllers (an Atari-style joystick and a trackball mouse) as "guts" nestled into housings made from molding putty and plastic pleasure commodities. I also replaced the trackball with a sphere of chalcopyrite, which is known in crystal lore as an aid for meditation and mystical discovery.
Interior Stroll has been exhibited in the Controller Complex showcase at Indie Bits in Columbia, SC, at Tritriangle and the Nightingale Cinema in Chicago, IL, Open Signal in Portland, OR, the Echo Park Film Center in Los Angeles, CA, Hair + Nails in Minneapolis, MN, and the Winnipeg Underground Film Festival
It uses a song, with permission, by Sonic Vibrational Healing: "The Final Frontier" from Royalty Free Movie Music Vol. 2: Future Primitive.