Bunker

Bunker creates a space in which the viewer may contemplate the paradoxes of modernity. As the viewer travels through different levels, they will be presented with scenarios that refer to the rhetorical paradoxes of a certain historical era.

The VR experience consists of five main areas — Entrance, Tunnel, War Room,Tennis Court, and Death, which will re-spawn the viewer back to the entrance.

Entrance

Tunnel

War Room

Tennis Court

Death
(Restart)

Entrance

Entrance is the area where the viewer is born. Several features installed in the area serve to confirm the viewer’s orientation, their scale, and their virtual presence. To show the scale of the space in relation to the viewer, I created a gallery with a door and windows all half-buried in the ground. If the viewer chooses to interact with the electricity box, it will ask the viewer to reconnect the broken wires in order to restore the electricity. In the process, the viewer will learn for the first time to use the controllers’ grabbing mechanism. Once electricity is restored, the light on the ceiling will point the way toward further exploration.

Tunnel

As the viewer follows the light, they will enter the Tunnel. The Tunnel presents a divergence between staying on the narrow platform and moving forward or falling off the platform into the pit at the center.  The former will lead to the upper level of the Tennis Court. The latter will lead to the War Room. From this point on, the two experiences will be completely parallel.

Falling

There are a few places in the bunker experience where the viewer has to fall in order to continue.

War Room

The moment the viewer falls into the War Room, the choral theme song of Mr. Bean, Ecce Homo Qui Est Faba (Behold the man who is a bean) starts to play. War Room is a virtual replica of the iconic conference room in Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove. The viewer will land in the center of the round conference table surrounded by chairs.

At the far end of the room, a white door indicates the exit. When the viewer goes through the door, they will enter the passage lined with rows of computer servers. Whenever a server detects the viewer’s controller in contact, it will issue an apologetic monologue: 

“ I’m sorry too, Dmitri. I’m very sorry. ”
“ Alright, you’re sorrier than I am. But I am sorry as well. ”
“ I am just as sorry as you are, Dmitri. ”
“ Don’t say that you’re more sorry than I am, because I’m capable of being just as sorry as you are. ”

Tennis Court

At the end of the passage sits a boat that will sail forward once the viewer steps onto its deck. This will bring the viewer to the final room, Tennis Court. The Tennis Court can be accessed through two ways. The tunnel route leads to the upper level; the boat leads to the lower level. The two levels are made parallel through a short but insurmountable gap.  The Tennis Court is an enlarged model based on the Salle du Jeu de Paume where the Tennis Court Oath took place.

Music: Pruitt Igoe, Philip Glass

At any point in the viewer’s exploration of the Tennis Court, should the viewer fall into the gaps or holes of the caissons, they will fall to their death. In Death, the viewer will slowly descend in boundless darkness, with the caisson formation above the viewer’s head serving as the sole visual cue of spatial relations. This is the final stage of the experience, and the only way for the viewer to return to the beginning of the program.

Death

Installation Plan
Two walls (20.54 ft length x 13.45 ft width x 8.86 ft height).

  • Wireframe diagram projection-mapped on walls, then traced by blue and black tape.

  • Vive headset cable suspended from ceiling.