With his doctoral thesis, Fachhochschule Dortmund employee Tobias Bieseke is making an age-old human dream possible: "Ndinguwe(Opens in a new tab) " allows the experience of being someone else. For many, this is more intense than expected. The work is currently making a guest appearance at Start Art Week in Düsseldorf.
One young person was visibly moved when he took off the XR headset. For several minutes, he had experienced himself as other people - people who are confronted with social grievances.
With the words "It was sad and beautiful. The intolerance was sad, but the experience of foreignness was beautiful", he returned the headset, went to his friends and let himself be comforted, Tobias Bieseke remembers the "Britney X" exhibition at Schauspiel Köln in spring 2024.
Tobias Bieseke completed his master's degree in the film study program at Fachhochschule Dortmund and is a research assistant in the digital lab "kiU" at Fachhochschule Dortmund U. He realized his XR experiment "Ndinguwe" in cooperation with the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. The title comes from the South African Xhosa language and means "I am you".
Four virtual personalities
When you put on the headset, you find yourself in a virtual environment with a large mirror in which you can choose between four virtual bodies (avatars): an old man, a woman with an amputated hand, a black man and an intersex person with a bald head, breasts and women's clothing.
The look is reminiscent of a VR computer game, but the feel is different. The aim is not to control the avatar as skillfully as possible, but to experience yourself as this person as much as possible. The program transfers the motor skills of the real body to the avatar: head, limbs, even the individual fingers move precisely synchronized.
Anyone who moves around in one of the strange virtual bodies and observes themselves in the virtual mirror can hardly distinguish between their virtual and their own self-image. As if that weren't enough, the program in the mirror superimposes the avatar onto the real body.
Each avatar is accompanied by a text spoken by actors that describes a borderline social situation. In the case of the black avatar, for example, this is the police operation in Dortmund in August 2022, in which 16-year-old Senegalese Mouhamed Dramé was shot dead by a police officer.
No wonder you have to take a deep breath afterwards.
Do not introduce. Knowledge.
What this installation can do is liberate people from stereotypes, says Tobias Bieseke. "Some people said afterwards: 'Now that I've experienced this, I have questions. If I met someone who only had one hand, I'd have something to talk about'," says the artist about the reactions. "The phenomenon of 'embodiment' is well documented by studies: When we adopt a certain physical posture, for example with a bent back or standing extra upright, our perception of ourselves and our environment changes."
Something similar happens with "Ndinguwe": the physical experience, which you can't otherwise have, broadens your empathic horizons. To put it simply: you no longer have to imagine what it would be like to be this other person. You experience it.
About the project
The XR installation is the artistic product of Tobias Bieseke's promotional work. The entire work bears the working title "Realitätshybride - Die Inszenierung erweiterter Realitäten als Erlebnisräume" and includes several other XR experiments, including on body feedback in XR environments.
Start Art Week Düsseldorf (23.8. to 1.9.2024) is a business know-how and networking event for the independent art, culture and creative scene in NRW. "Ndinguwe" can be seen there from August 28 to 30, from 10 am to 6 pm, at Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences in the foyer of the Faculty of Design, Building 6, Münsterstraße 156, 40476 Düsseldorf.
"Ndinguwe" can next be seen at the Next-Level-Festival Dortmund from November 14 to 17, 2024.