Belonging & Technology
"Much of who we are is shaped by the place that we are in, I wanted Inter(mediate) Spaces to empower people to also shape the place around them."
I first used VR to explore a new way of remembering. Listening to stories firsthand from people unable to root themselves in rapidly developing landscapes, I learned the issue wasn’t change itself; change is inevitable. It was the pace at which it changed. People didn’t feel they had agency in shaping the landscape.
In 2021, I left New York City, a place I called home for 10 years, on a Fulbright Scholarship to make a virtual reality project in Berlin. I wanted to understand what it meant to create meaning in a place where I had no personal history. My family has a history of migration. Like my ancestors, many migrate today not out of choice - as it was for me - but because they are forced out by war and other external circumstances. Yet, they create community despite constraint.
In Berlin, I found a community in the process of creating, and I wanted to bring this process to aspects of my life where there was disconnection. As a Chinese-American woman living in Berlin, a city without a Chinatown, I have found myself longing for the connection to Chinese community I had in New York City. At the same time, my curiosity about technology has brought me closer to other cultures and people in Berlin. This project is a way I can bridge these gaps while questioning the ways in which technology is developed and adopted into our daily lives.
I felt empowered to use new technology in a different way and I hope that Inter(mediate) spaces empowers others’ to do the same.
— Chloé Lee
Influences
A collection of texts, films, and projects that have influenced the development of Inter(mediate) Spaces.
Literature
- Species of Spaces and Other Pieces Georges Perec
- The Poetics of Space Gaston Bachelard
- Invisible Cities Italo Calvino
- The Practice of Everyday Life Michel de Certeau
Film & Media
- Blade Runner (1982) Aesthetic reference for the dense, layered urban environment.
- Ghost in the Shell (1995) Concepts of digital memory and identity.
- Enter the Void (2009) Camera movement and out-of-body perspective.