Danielle Freakley
VR Imaginary Friend
Concept
This is an imaginary friend world in VR. The VR work allows users to explore the imaginary friends of other people (based on real ones from the lives of others) and create their own imaginary friend (based on a real one from their life) in VR.
The idea of imaginary friendship is analysed expansively in this work and reaches beyond the idea of them simply belonging to childhood or states of psychosis. The kinds of imaginary friends explored include social media relationships, gods, grindr matches, fan relationships with rockstars and more. This is a collective inner-social subworld.
Installation
Interactive
Roaming
Performance
Exhibition
Concept Phase
In Development
Sculptures
Your Second Hand
VR Imaginary Friend
Hear the Call
Speecheoke
Your Second Hand
VR Imaginary Friend
Hear the Call
Better Version of Yourself
Speecheoke
Dance Literacy
This is Your Life
Equal Opportunity
VR Imaginary Friend
This is Your Life
Equal Opportunity
Speecheoke
Dance Literacy
This is Your Life
Equal Opportunity
Sculptures
Your Second Hand
VR Imaginary Friend
Hear the Call
Better Version of Yourself
Speecheoke
Dance Literacy
This is Your Life
Equal Opportunity
Better Version of Yourself
This is Your Life
VR Imaginary Friend
Hear the Call
Dance Literacy
Previously Exhibited
Your Second Hand
Speecheoke
Equal Opportunity
Sculptures
Audience
Audiences can use the VR headset to explore imaginary friends of others.
Space
Minimum of two VR devices. Extra VR headsets can be ordered if the expected audience size and space is large enough.
Isolated area for 3 metre radius per VR device. An attendant needs to show audiences how to use headsets and monitor the VR headsets.
Development
FELLOWSHIP TO DEVELOP THE WORK
Fellowship to develop and produce the VR Work from the Copyright Agency Dec 2019.
FUTURE EXHIBITIONS
VR work booked to be shown at HERE Art Centre, New York (postponed due to pandemic) most likely to happen late 2021 or 2022.
PREVIOUS IMAGINARY FRIEND PROJECTS
2011 Imaginary Friend sculpture works begin.
2014 - 2015 Imaginary Friend solo performances began, social interactions with people privately as their constructed imaginary friend.
2016 - 2018 Imaginary friend performances where a team of people with various skills perform privately as the imaginary friends of others. Showing of this work is shown (with confidentiality agreements) at Tate, Liverpool Biennial and a number of shows in other countries and galleries internationally in Europe, Seychelles and the USA.
2019 Finalist for ACMI Mordant VR Commission for new Imaginary Friend work, Winner Fellowship to produce VR work from Copyright Agency.
2020 Research and development of work, early phases, Kiss Club presentation at PICA showing some of the Imaginary Friend research so far and releasing an experience sampling study, to gather more data on inner social relationships.
Benefits
- Challenges contemporary understandings of imaginary relationships especially with prevalence to online relationships.
- Invites audience to consider and recreate some imaginary relationships from their life.
Challenges
- Audience privacy in sharing these imaginary relationships. Contracts must be drawn to protect audiences.
- Ethical considerations of audience sharing such relationships, consultation with psychologist concerning this work and clear measures taken with ethical considerations for audiences.
- This work needs a lot of time to develop. I am currently considering which VR company to work with in making this work and potentially taking a course in VR myself too, which will take a long time.
Covid Accomodations
This work could potentially be downloaded on personal home VR headsets or online versions of the VR work could be shown on a brower. However, it is not ideal to have a browser version of a VR work. This work will most likely be ready in 2022, a vaccine may be available by this time and Covid accomodations may not be necessary.
Imaginary Friend Website Password: imagineinternet
PLEASE KNOW THESE WEBLINKS BELOW HAVE ONLY BEEN SHOWN/DEVELOPED SO FAR PRIVATELY. AN AUDIENCE IN A GALLERY HAS NEVER SEEN THESE. THIS IS COMPLETELY NEW TO THE PUBLIC.
Please be aware the development pages which have comment section, psychological evaulation, interviews etc will not be accessible to the public in the public database access.
Please be aware this is another version of the work. The entrance where you must choose one out of two options may be replicated to find the Imaginary Friend however the Imaginary Friend page (where you can make the imaginary friend live in some way) will instead be the VR project.
Please be aware the development pages which have comment section, psychological evaulation, interviews etc will not be viewed in this in VR version.