Documentation of House of Shadow Silence at the Academy Theater in Portland, OR on August 4 & 5, 2017.
"House of Shadow Silence" is a audio/visual VR experience that transports audience to the Film Guild Cinema. Frederick Kiesler, a De-Stijl artist, designed for the iconic cinema so that "the spectator must be able to lose himself in an imaginary endless space." One of its groundbreaking innovations was a "screen-o-scope"–a device for projecting onto the walls and ceiling so that viewers would be immersed in the drama on screen. When the cinema opened in New York City in 1929, its multimedia elements were left out due to budgetary constraints.
In "House of Shadow Silence," viewers float through the cinema–through the mechanical eye at the front, and into the filmic grain of the projected films. Looking around, they see geometric forms animating from the walls and ceiling. Simulations of film projectors cover the architecture and moving forms, creating a collision of avant-garde filmmaking and contemporary computer graphics.
More info: mantissa.ca/projects/houseofshadowsilence.php
