Empathy At The Roots: Becoming A Tree (in VR)

Winslow Porter, Co-director of Tree (VR) and Co-founder of New Reality Co will walk us through a brief history of how virtual reality experiences have allowed audiences to explore new and often challenging perspectives through the eyes of another person, and even another being.

From Sundance to the World Economic Forum, he will give a deep dive into his creative practice as well as detailing the challenges and key takeaways of making the award-winning experience Tree as well as other influential VR works, Giant and CLOUDS.

The talk will be followed by a discussion with Brazilian artist and activist Carla Maldonado whose body of work responds to socio-political issues; patriarchy and the environmental crisis, and explores the struggle of progressive movements in Bolsonaro’s Brazil.

Speakers

Winslow Porter is a Brooklyn based director, producer and creative technologist specializing in ground-breaking virtual/augmented reality and large-scale immersive installations. Starting out as a commercial film and video director/editor, he pivoted to interactive music for modern dance and art/tech after graduating from NYU Tisch’s Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) in 2010. With over 10 years of experiential work under his belt, he has helped create interactive art experiences for the World Economic Forum, TED, UN General Assembly, Google, Delta, Diesel and Wired to name a few. Winslow also produced the Tribeca Film Festival Transmedia Award-winning documentary CLOUDS in 2014, among other acclaimed new media projects. Winslow formed the award-winning, impact-focused studio New Reality Company with Milica Zec in 2016. New Reality Company focuses on using immersive technology to communicate and embody core principals of pressing environmental and social issues. The goal is to create a personal emotional response in each participant, so that complex and often difficult concepts can be shown and felt more than just being told and felt by the storyteller. New Reality Co also think its important to transport more than just the eyes and ears for an impactful experience, so multiple senses are engaged throughout the experiences, further enhancing the feeling of embodiment. New Reality Co created both Tree and Giant. Tree, a multi-sensory VR experience based around become a Kapok tree in the Peruvian Amazon, received a range of awards including the Games For Change Award for Most Innovative, Webby People’s Voice award for VR: Interactive, Game or Real-Time, and a Lumiere Award for Best VR Location Based Short. Porter and Zec were the first AR/VR artists in residence at Technicolor Experience Center, an immersive hub in Los Angeles. Also in 2017 they were both named designers in residence at A/D/O, a design center in Greenpoint Brooklyn; the two were selected to Adweek’s Top 100 creatives as two of only twelve digital innovators. Winslow is a Cultural Leader at World Economic Forum in both Tianjin (201

Carla Maldonado is a multimedia artist, working in photography, film and installation. Her work responds to socio-political issues; patriarchy and the environmental crisis, and explores the struggle of progressive movements in Bolsonaro’s Brazil, and her immigrant experience in Trump’s era U.S. Maldonado’s intuitively observational process is based on photographic and video documentation of environments she navigates and people she encounters – focusing on rebels, misfits and revolutionaries. She showed at the Satellite Art Show in Miami and Brooklyn; Film Fest at the Farm, Rhinebeck, NY; School of Visual Arts, NYC, SoMad Studio, NYC (all 2019); Barcelona Planet Film Festival, Spain (2018); and The Knockdown Center, Brooklyn (2017). She has BFA in Fashion Design from Senai Cetiqt, Rio de Janeiro, 2007; and MFA in Photography, Video & Related Media, SVA in New York, 2019. Maldonado lives and works in New York City and is currently AIM Fellow at The Bronx Museum. www.carlamaldonado.com

Fanny Lakoubay is a New-York-based communication & operations specialist with 12+ years of experience in art+tech, blockchain, and ESG projects. She is the head of communications for RadicalxChange foundation. Besides, she is involved in CADAF art fairs, held by New Art Academy, and ETHTURIN hackathon. She regularly speaks at conferences around the world and guest teaches at New York University, Fashion Institute of Technology and Christie’s Education. Prior to this, she worked with larger organizations such as Christie’s auction house, Collectrium SaaS inventory management system, Artnet e-commerce site, and Societe Generale & Royal Bank of Scotland banks. She holds a master degree from HEC Paris business school and a BA in Art History / Art Appraisal, and speaks English, French and German.