Tuan Mu, Rodolphe Macabéo
Oyat, 2025
VR experience for Meta Quest 3
Oyat is a XR interactive and immersive experience that weaves together ecology, natural disasters, ink painting, and the Taoist cosmological view. The work is inspired by the 2022 wildfire that broke out in the Dune of Pilat. The title Oyat in French refers to the European marram grass that grows on the dune. The plant plays a key role in stabilising the dunes, but intriguingly, once the dunes have become stable, the plant gradually disappears.
Using 3D scans of a withered piece of wood collected from the Dune of Pilat, the work invites viewers into the interior of the dead tree to explore the vitality of a forest. Inside, painted with ashes, the surface of the withered wood evokes a cave mural of Ni Zan’s shan shui landscapes. Traditionally, shan shui painting represents a dialogue between humans and nature. In the work, the viewer’s bodily movements become metaphors for brush and ink painting, listening to, and creating nature within a virtual space as a way to reflect on ecology and catastrophe. Through mixed reality, viewers are led into a space where the boundary between virtual and real dissolves, bringing them closer to the reality of nature itself. Towards the end of the experience, viewers encounter a poetic space composed of marram grass, maritime pines, and shifting dunes. The space evokes the rebirth of the Dune of Pilat scorched by wildfire, with its landscape rearranging based on the viewer’s bodily movements.
Roomscale, 7mins20secs
Creative Team
Director | Tuan Mu
Artists | Tuan Mu, Rodolphe Macabéo
XR Software Developers | Lin Hung, Huang Chien-Jung
Composer and Sound Creator | Rodolphe Macabéo
3D Scanning | Rodolphe Macabéo
Typographer | Lucas Macabéo
Special Thanks | Dana Kim
Supported by the National Culture and Arts Foundation
IMAGES
VIDEO LINK
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Tuan Mu (Taiwan, b. 1994) is an artist and independent curator based in Taipei. After graduating from Taipei National University of the Arts with a major in Ink Painting, he began seeking ways in which new media could reinterpret the unique worldview of traditional Asian culture, using a poetical approach to explore human perception and thinking in this age of technology. His artworks often develop from Buddhist and Taoist philosophies, East Asian animism and mythological tales. Combining media such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, animation, sound performances, ink painting and calligraphy, Tuan Mu’s artworks compose a transdisciplinary narrative structure, and engage the viewer in a dialogue. His artworks have been presented in numerous international exhibitions, including Durres Biennale, Athens Digital Arts Festival, Asia Digital Art Exhibition, CutOut Fest, Miami New Media Festival, Now & After International Video Art Festival, Venice Immersive Market Taiwan Pavilion, Festival ECRA, CineGlobe Film Festival, CYFEST Media Art Festival and International Digitalkunst Festival.
After four years as head of sound creation at an immersive creation studio, Rodolphe Macabéo is at the cutting edge of musical innovation, blending generative music, instrumental improvisation, spatialization and artificial intelligence to redefine the boundaries between electronic music and sound environments. Field recordings and experimental listening devices - such as the stethophone and electromagnetic sensors - enable him to capture the raw essence of reality and open up his music to bioacoustic perspectives. This meticulous attention to sound detail has enabled him, via the studio, to present his work in international institutions such as the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, UCCA Labs and the Boxes Art Museum in China, the Ludwig Museum in Budapest, MUTEK in Canada, as well as the Avant Galerie Vossen and the FRAC in France. Today, Rodolphe thrives on immersive performances in which his innovative sound techniques combine the precision of stage performance with the intensity of electronic improvisation. His first solo Ep Dans la distance (in the distance) released on 1 June 2025 shows a conscious return to his first loves of writing French lyrics, singing and playing guitar. These are the essential ingredients of what he calls the Deep Folk a style that takes on its full meaning when he spatializes all these elements on his 12.2 sound-system to make them dance around the audience.
If you are interested in exhibiting or viewing this artistic VR experience, please send an email to us.
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