Virtual festival and exhibition
Punto de Inflexión (Turning Point)
VII Arquia Festival
2020
Arquia Foundation, Barcelona, Spain
Hosted virtually in Mozilla Hubs
Curated by Gonzalo Herrero Delicado
Design by Space Popular
VR coding by Roman Miletitch
Arquia Foundation team: Sol Candela, Alicia Padilla, María Garcia Codina, Javier Peña and Montserrat Lamela.
Speakers: Peter Cook, Carme Pinós, Anupama Kundoo, Iñaqui Carnicero, Sol Candela, Naiara Montero, Marta Pelegrín, Iñigo Tudanca, Iñigo Ocamica, María José Marcos, Ventura Godoy, María Megías, Marc Sánchez, Juan Ignacio Prieto, Estefanía Grandal, Pedro Azevedo, Susana Rosmaninho, Arturo Franco, Cristina Domínguez, Fernando Hernández, Jose María Rueda, Carlos Gor, Alejandro Infantes, Álvaro Carrillo, Ignacio Hornillos, Enrique Espinosa, Fran Silvestre, José Francisco García, Javier De Andrés, Juan Chacón (Zuloark), Santiago Pradilla, Ander Bados, María Montenegro, Ester Roldán, Joao Quintela, Gabriel Ruiz-Larrea, Samuel Gonçalves, Déborah López, Lluis Alexandre Casanovas, Laura Bonell, Daniel López-Dòriga, Paula Vilaplana y Javier del Amo.
We live in a world in a constant state of flux defined by multiple global ecological, health, social and political crises. After several months working from home, attending endless video conferences and watching online talks through our phones and laptops, we need to rethink how we can start a cultural transition into the digital as well as creating new forms of interaction with other people. This project was an opportunity to de-alienate ourselves, reconnect with the world around us and create more socially engaging cultural platforms.
Due to the impact of Covid-19, the VII Arquia Festival titled Turning Point (Punto de Inflexión) and organised by Arquia Foundation, was forced to move into a virtual format. Initially planned to be held in Barcelona, we commissioned a virtual social platform to host the festival programme and collateral activities that was inspired by this city. Space Popular designed this platform where attendees and speakers could interact with each other. A VR space to host a two-day programme of talks, two new exhibition galleries and screen a new documentary.
The result is an immersive social space and spatial experience inspired by the city of Barcelona. A project that challenges the the possibilities of architectural experience in VR and how cultural events might be transformed in the near future to create new forms of interaction while reducing their environmental impact.
More info here + interview for Dezeen.
The exhibition was accompanied by a new 42-min documentary titled Punto de Inflexión directed by Javier Peña and produced by Arquia Foundation, showing the new architecture scene of Barcelona, where the festival was initially planned to take place.