ANICCA
visual music in virtual reality
(password - visualmusic)
everything that arises must cease
“Anicca" is the Pali word for impermanence, and one of the three marks of existence in the Buddhist canon. This is a piece about the arc of any human experience, be it a moment, a period of time, place, relationship, or life itself, from emptiness to form and back to emptiness.
"Anicca" is also an exploration of the three mediums I have played in from childhood - animation, music and dance. I set out to make this piece a full collaboration between myself, the composer, and the dancers, to make each medium integral to the development of the other by creating them simultaneously. We all met weekly to exchange ideas, references, and critique from the very early stages up until the music and dance were complete. The visuals were composed much in the same way as the music was, by creating and fine-tuning loops, and laying them out over time in a way that, while non-narrative, is still very much structured. Nothing is accompaniment - all is connected.
My main hope with this piece is to give the viewer a place in which to experience and reflect on the impermanence of all things, and be aware of their reactions to it, in order to bring this lesson into the way they live their lives. If not that, then at least I hope it will be a peaceful place to experience wonder. I have had viewers dance in the headset, wander off trying to walk around the animations, draw with their hands in the air, exclaim things and smile and cry. So far, it seems to be working...
