Institutional Presentation Statement

Keywords: Experimental XR approaches, European XR communities, new narratives, common and sustainable XR.

Realities in Transition (RiT) is a project co-funded by the European Union that aims to explore and support alternative XR productions and to experiment and promote new narratives and creative processes. RiT considers creative practices as the appropriate experimental context for reflecting on the challenges and opportunities of extending reality by digital means. Art and design provide the imaginative scope to assess the impact of technological developments in a social context and investigate radical alternatives.

• Vanessa Hannesschläger (AT) is head of European Projects of Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Austria. She holds a PhD in literature from the University of Vienna, where she teaches digital humanities. Her research focuses on new narratives and forms in theatre, a topic she explores in her work at Ars Electronica in projects around digital theatre and new approaches to XR. In the European policy context, Vanessa advocates for digital infrastructure for the arts and humanities, data literacy and Open Science.
• Boris Debackere (NL) is Lab Manager at V2_ Lab for the Unstable Media in Rotterdam, an instigator of artistic projects which interrogate and illuminate contemporary issues in art, science, technology, and society. He is also a researcher lecturing at the Media and Information Design department of LUCA School of Arts. As a media artist focusing on sound, his practice revolves around the materiality and performativity of media that appear as virtual environments.