Category: Archive [edu]

Immersive Arts Practices Doubles, Twins and Avatars

Tuesdays: 26.09. / 03.10. / 10.10. / 17.10. / 24.10. / 31.10. / 14.11. / 21.11. / 28.11. / 05.12.2023
Immersive Arts Space (1.J30) | 18:45-20:30

The Immersive Arts Practices aims to provide a general introduction to the current use of doubles, twins and avatars in films, games, the arts, and social media. Using the technologies that are available in the Immersive Arts space, the course also provides a basic understanding of creating 3D representations of humans and integrating avatars in digital media environments and immersive experiences, such as virtual and augmented reality (VR, AR) photogrammetry and 3D scan, volumetric capture, motion capture, and projection mapping. In small interdisciplinary groups, the participants then develop their own projects and implement their double, twin and avatar within the range of their own capacity and the available technologies.

Registration via Vorlesungsverzeichnis

Lecturers: Stella Speziali and other members of the IAS

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Module from 11th to 15th September 2023

In painting, photography and film, landscapes are transformed into dream images and stylized into archetypes. Landscapes are contemporary witnesses of collective longings and dystopias.
With immersive technologies such as video mapping, virtual reality and spatial audio, these become multimodal experiences. In interdisciplinary groups the module aims to work on scenes for spatial or object projections in the Immersive Arts Space and test possible interactions with the motion capture system. Getting to know the workflows and experimenting with immersive media are the main focus. In this short week, experimental installations, sketches and small projects will be created, exploring diverse approaches and perspectives on digitally designed landscapes through immersive media.

Team: Eric Larrieux, Valentin Huber, Stella Speziali, Thomas Isler, Miriam Loertscher

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Module from 4th to 15th September 2023

The module is aimed at students from all departments at ZHdK who want to artistically explore the available technology in Immersive Arts Space and in particular the potential of three-dimensional media installations.

Autonomous flying helium drones will be realized within two weeks. Students will work in groups composed of as many different disciplines as possible to cover as broad a range of expertise as possible. The groups will have time for experiments, for the development and construction of a helium drone (airship or balloon with drone control) and for the development of a spatial installation concept.
The team of lecturers from different disciplines (Scenography, Industrial Design, Spacial Projection) is available to advise on the concept development and support the planning of possible further developments.

Lead: Martin Fröhlich, Roman Jurt
Further lecturers: Stella Speziali, Mariana Grünig, Melody Chua

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Open Lecture by Rasa Smite | 25. November 2025 |
Kino Toni (3.G02), Toni-Areal

How can data become experience? And how might artistic interpretation turn scientific data into embodied ecological knowledge?

In her lecture, artist and researcher Rasa Smite explores how environmental data can be transformed into multisensory, emotion-evoking experiences. She traces her experimental practice from data sonification and visualization to sensorialization in virtual-reality environments such as Atmospheric Forest (2020) and Solarceptors (2025). Extending this approach, she draws on Don Ihde’s concept of multisensory science and Yusoff and Gabrys’s notion of climate imaginaries, arguing that the artistic sensorialization of data in immersive environments can expand scientific knowing — opening new modes of sensing, perceiving, and connecting with the changing planet.

This lecture is part of the series Interfacing Ecologies, that explores how interactions take place in more-than-human worlds and how we can access these interactions in the field.
With guests from various disciplines and fields, the questions is asked how we can formulate and put into practice new understandings of interactions in environments and ecologies, and how we might deal with these challenges that are so close to life.
https://interactiondesign.zhdk.ch/events/interfacing-ecologies/

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Lecture by Chris Salter (IAS) and Nils Röller (Philosophie) | 26.11.25, Hörsaal 1, Toni Areal

The lecture “Machinen versprechen Zukünfte” is part of the lecture series “Gemeinsinn. Zur Zukunft der Kunsthochschule” and is an event from the Critical Thinking minor led by Judith Siegmund, professor of philosophical aesthetics, with contributions from members of all departments at ZHdK.

In global politics, many people seem to be increasingly preoccupied with differences. What brings us together, what drives us apart – in relation to the art academy: practice from theory, music from conceptual art, film from dance, and research from performance, the political from the aesthetic, etc.? Two professors/teachers from different departments each give a joint lecture: What is special about the arts, design, their theories, and their teaching? And what answers do they have to the pressing questions of our time?

All information about the lecture series can be [here]

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Interdisciplinary workshop with BA students (Z-module), Sept. 2021

The workshop with the German title Tanz der fliegenden Lichtobjekte offered an introduction into the basic technical infrastructure and into current research activities of the Immersive Arts Space. The students designed and implemented prototypes of three-dimensional media installations with helium drones, spatial projections and 3D audio. They constructed their own zeppelin models, developed control modalities and designed video textures for them. After two weeks three immersive experiences were presented with a variety of different artistic and narrative approaches. The workshop is based on the findings and methods of the artistic research project Helium Drones.

Students:
Micaela Brazerol, Julia Huerlimann, Jana Meyer, Tamina Kronenberg, Yannick Meyer, Laura Nan, Carla Opetnik, Fabio Saccani, Michael Schlapbach, Sophia Strickerschall, Janosch Tillich, Violetta Vigh

Teaching staff:
Martin Fröhlich (head of the workshop, Immersive Arts Space)
Roman Jurt (Design & Technology Lab)
Serena Cangiano (Head of Fablab Supsi, Lugano)
Stella Speziali, (Immersive Arts Space)
Lukas Sander (MA Stage Design)
Johannes Schütt (Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology)

Illuminated Flying Objects are featured in the Annual Report 2021 by ZHdK. Read full article [here]

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In the Z-Module “Immersive Landscapes in Art and Film” in September 2021, students from the fields of design, film, theatre and fine arts dealt with photogrammetry, virtual reality and 3D sound. Within two weeks, the groups developed three different immersive landscapes:

– Using virtual reality glasses, an actor could discover a walk-in visual scenery by means of the sense of touch and change it by interacting with virtual objects.
– Real hands became moving digital sculptures in a planetary virtual reality landscape using photogrammetry and motion capture.
– White rigid bodies became transformers of an abstract soundscape via motion capture in a participatory performance in immersive arts space.

In addition to engaging with transdisciplinary art and film projects, the students were able to test and evaluate the latest ‘interactive experience’ with Birdly at Somniacs in a field trip.

Teaching Staff:
Miriam Loertscher (Institute for Performing Arts and Film)
Thomas Isler (Department Fine Arts)
Jyrgen Ueberschär (Departement Fine Arts)
Valentin Huber (Department Performing Arts and Film/ Immersive Arts Space)
Stella Speziali (Immersive Arts Space) 
Eric Larrieux (Immersive Arts Space)

Interdisciplinary module with BA students, Aug/Sept. 2020 

The two-week workshop Dreams & Dystopia (Immersive Landscapes II) focused on the creation of cinematic landscapes (artificial, urban or natural spaces) for three-dimensional media such as spatial projection or virtual reality. Artistic approaches from painting, photography, film and CGI were taught and the differences worked out interactively with the students.

Teaching staff:
Thomas Isler, Department of Fine Arts
Miriam Loertscher, Department of the Performing Arts and Film
Jyrgen Ueberschär, Department of Fine Arts,
Valentin Huber, Stella Speziali, Immersive Arts Space

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Interdisciplinary workshop with BA students (Z-module), Aug/Sept. 2020

Over the course of two weeks, groups of students from different art and design programs, conceived and constructed helium drones (airships or balloons with drone navigation control) and developed a spatial installation concept including a 3D sound design. The illumination of the helium drones is achieved either by remote controlled moving lights or by projection mapping. The movement of the drones is controlled by a computer-aided tracking system.

The Z-module with the German title Tanz der fliegenden Lichtobjekte resulted in a variety of exciting flying objects, including a large floating manta ray. The workshop is based on the findings and methods of the artistic research project Helium Drones.

Teaching staff:
Martin Fröhlich (Immersive Arts Space)
Roman Jurt (Design & Technology Lab)
Nadia Fistarol (MA&BA stage design)
Johannes Schütt (Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology)

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«Have you ever wondered how a bat perceives the world?» BATVISION offers the chance to playfully explore how bats use echo-location to detect their surroundings. The VR-experience visualizes the bat’s auditory sensation and makes it more tangible. Surrounded by complete darkness, the virtual world only becomes visible when the users start shouting. BATVISION simulates the ultrasonic navigation of bats, enables new forms of perception and raises the awareness for an endangered species.

BATVISION is a collaboration between the ZHdK Industrial Design program and the Immersive Arts Space. In their bachelor thesis Eliane Zihlmann and Raffaele Grosjean developed the concept of the VR experience and the associated hardware design. They were supported by IASpace staff members Oliver Sahli (programming, visual implementation, interaction control), Chris Elvis Leisi (implementation of multi-user functionality) and Florian Bruggisser (3D scanning and point-cloud processing).

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