Reflecting on Practice: Showcase projects
Michelle Hessel – Hidden in Plain Sight
Elin Festoy – The message is in the gameplay: how we are showing the challenges of Children
Born of War through the nurture genre
Karen Vanderborght – How the virtual can be real
Hidden in Plain Sight
Hidden in Plain Sight is a mixed-media installation that shares stories of New York City
street food vendors through interactive 3D printed sculptures of food carts and the people
behind them. Immigrant communities are responsible for the creation of the iconic culture
of street food that is so particular to New York. Together, the three people portrayed in the
project reveal different pieces of a complex and broken street vending system.
In this series of portraits, each work features video and audio merged into 3D printed high-
fidelity sculptures of food carts and the people behind them – Ana, Dany, and Thiru. The
piece offers a new approach to documentary, merging older media formats with newer
technologies. 3D Scanning techniques were explored in order to use the physical models
of the carts as small canvases. When users interact with these, audio is triggered and the
vendors starts sharing their stories in their own words. As the narrative unfolds,
minimalistic animations that complement the audio tracks are mapped on top of the cart.
The message is in the gameplay: how we are showing the challenges of Children
Born of War through the nurture genre
”My Child Lebensborn” is a mobile game that tells the true story of what happened to the
children of German soldiers in Norway after World War II. The game is set in 1951, and
the player is set to nurture and care for a 7 year old child starting school. As the game
commences, the player is challenged to help the child through an unfolding set of events
based on stories from the Lebensborn-children born in Norway during World War II.
The player also uncovers the background of the child, learning the fate of one Norwegian
Lebensborn child. The Lebensborn programme was a genetics programme started by
Heinrich Himmler, to try to create the new Aryan rulers for the Third Reich.
The game is being developed in cooperation with the Norwegian Lebensborn children to
ensure that the game is representative for this group of Children Born of War.
Our goal with the game is to let the player experience the challenges for Children Born of
War – the children of enemy soldiers growing up in hateful, post-war societies. The
game is part of a transmedia project, which also contains a classic documentary game
and an educational package. We are also cooperating with the International and
Interdisciplinary Research Network for Children Born of War and in dialogue with
international NGOs to coordinate an awareness campaign for today’s CBOW-children.
Children are born of the hated enemy soldiers in all conflicts and today we face the
challenge of taking care of the children of such enemies as IS and Boko Haram.
How the virtual can be real
Many current VR documentary pieces are static and founded on a conventional approach to storytelling. The viewers do little to no interacting with their environment. VR pieces like “Clouds Over Sidra” – from UNVR and “Cut-Off” by Vice, although compelling, subject the viewer to linear stories as a placid observer. “Without A Roof”, changes the dynamic radically, by introducing a first person perspective in an environment with game-like interactions. The authenticity of the story is impersonated by its subject, who eases the VR participant in and out of the experience. His presence, off- (as a voice-over) and on-screen keep the balance in check between documentary principles and game mechanics.