I interviewed Ceci Est Mon Cœur (This is My Heart) co-directors Stephane Hueber-Blies and Nicolas Blies at Venice Immersive 2024. See more context in the rough transcript below.
Here’s their artist’s statement:
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Rough Transcript
[00:00:05.458] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR Podcast. Hello, my name is Kent Bye, and welcome to the Voices of VR Podcast. It's a podcast that looks at the structures and forms of immersive storytelling and the future of spatial computing. You can support the podcast at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. So continuing my series of looking at different immersive projects from Venice Immersive 2024, today's episode is with a piece called CCS Moncure, or This Is My Heart. So this was a really beautiful, visually alluring piece that had these like three different screens that were like arranged and kind of like a step arrangement or kind of like a Z within the context of a room. So there is kind of like the silk like fabric that you could see through and there are some projections on top of it. And then some really abstract visual lighting that was being used there. The story that's being told is kind of like a poetic interpretation of some of the experiences of childhood trauma, sexual trauma, illness that the co-directors who are brothers collaborated in building. There's also these kind of shawls that people were wearing that had these different lights that were stitched into it. And so you had these LEDs that were lights. glowing in these different colors and so people were free to roam around and change their perspective as they watch this experience there wasn't any explicit interactivity but there was an ability for you to kind of move around and change your perspective of the visual lighting effects that you were seeing within the context of this piece so that's what we're coming on today's episode of the voices of vr podcast so this interview with the team behind ccs moncure happened on thursday august 29th 2024 so with that let's go ahead and
[00:01:44.807] Nicolas Blies: dive right in so hi i'm nicolas i'm an artist and a filmmaker and with stefan my brother we form an artistic duo since now many years our previous work was a film documentary which is called zero impunity and cecil mocker is our first immersive experience
[00:02:10.819] Stephane Hueber-Blies: So I'm Stéphane Hubert-Bliz, I'm the brother. And yes, we are not a VR artist or XR artist originally, but mostly filmmakers. And yes, The Seamaker is our first piece, but it's the consequence of a lot of work in... We are also a producer in VR. And with A-Ban, our company, because we are also the co-founder of A-Ban, it's a Luxembourg production company, and we produce a lot of VR pieces, like Cosmos Business from Tupac Martyr, Seven Lives from Ian Coonan, etc. So, yes, we are able to have some... Some what? Some experience. Yes, some ability doing VR.
[00:02:56.502] Kent Bye: Right. And so maybe you could each give a bit more context as to your background and then your journey into VR.
[00:03:02.825] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yeah. My background is mostly the literature. I studied in a university and the storytelling in general, storytelling. So I mostly engage it all about writing things. Yes. And Nicolas is mostly in the music.
[00:03:21.365] Nicolas Blies: So yes, my background is linked to music. I'm a former music composer for documentary, for animation, for feature films. And yes, and also my background is also artistry. So I'm very used to visual and designs.
[00:03:39.159] Kent Bye: And then how did XR, immersive media, immersive storytelling first come onto your radars? Maybe you could take me back to what was the inciting incident or the turning point for you to get into this space?
[00:03:51.525] Stephane Hueber-Blies: The turning point, as I said, we are also producers, so we decided for the safety of our company to explore also a new kind of storytelling. We were specialized with our company in social impact, the documentary mostly, etc. And I don't remember exactly when, but 10 years ago, we decided to do the first VR film, which was called the Fan Club from Vincent Ravalek as a producer. And because we wanted to explore a different way to tell stories because we are, with Zero Impunity for example, our last movie, very interested by the hybridization of different kind of material like animation, live action, performative art, etc. We mixed all together. and for us VR was something very relevant at this time to explore. But we had a lot of difficulties at this time 10 years ago to see what as artists, as a producer it was kind of okay, but as an artist it was very difficult for us to see what kind of piece we can do because it wasn't easy at this time for us to admit that VR could be a response for our problematic storytelling.
[00:05:07.642] Kent Bye: Yeah, and for your own interactions of seeing different pieces, were there other pieces that were out there that gave you the inspiration to dig even deeper? You said that you were doing stuff more for business reasons to make sure that you were staying relevant, but I'm wondering if there were other projects that were out there that were inspiring you to see what might be possible with the medium.
[00:05:28.856] Nicolas Blies: Like Stéphane said before, our main purpose as an artist is hybridation. Since now, for 10 or 12 years, we are very interested in mixing mediums and trying to find the best way to tell stories. I mean, each story can have this specific medium to touch the audience. So for us, the first thing is to find this medium And when we decided to work on Ceci est mon coeur, it was exactly like we did on other works. I have this story, how now can I touch my audience? What is relevant to do? And for us, because Ceci est mon coeur is about the reconciliation with our trauma bodies, it was very obvious for us to find a medium in which we can be more sensitive, in which we can play with new sensations. So a feature film or documentary was not relevant. And at the beginning, we were working on a VR approach, so with an headset. But after a few weeks, a few months maybe, we decided to stop with the headset because we strongly felt this need of having something concrete and material. So we needed to work with the concrete world and the sensitive world directly. Directly in your eyes, directly in the space.
[00:07:08.243] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yes, we wanted also to explore light. It was important for us to explore light. So for us, VR etc. wasn't the good way to explore this specific topic. So yes, we decided to do it in the real world. That's all. So it was a choice we made some months after starting to think about the project.
[00:07:33.129] Kent Bye: And so it sounds like as you're mixing the media, there's a bit of a dialogue that happens between the different design practices of those media, where when you're writing a script, you have more of a pre-production, production, and then post-production, where it's a little bit more linear, where the interactive media ends up being a little bit more dynamic and interactive. And you come up with a visual, maybe that changes something. So I'm wondering if this was a piece where you started with the written narration that we're listening to, or if this is something where you were also more exploring the visual aesthetics and other things. Talk about where you began.
[00:08:10.854] Stephane Hueber-Blies: We began by the sound. We wanted first to tell the story with words, with music, with sound. This is the main part of the project. And then we add the different, like layout, so the visuals, the light of the garment, the aesthetics of the garment, etc. This came after. But the first piece of the piece, was the sound because for us it was very important to create poetry and so make sure that we could have a chance to emerge the spectators in our story. Yeah.
[00:08:49.026] Nicolas Blies: Before having the sound, we had the text for sure. So Stéphane wrote the text. It was really the beginning of the... It was the first piece of the work. And then, yes, like he said, we wanted to work the sound and the narration through the story because for us, immersion is first the sound. It's impossible for us to have a good piece if you don't have good sounds. This is for us really the most important thing.
[00:09:16.920] Stephane Hueber-Blies: But when we speak about the sound, we mostly speak about rhythm. For us, this is the main part of the project. So, for example, as said just Nicola, the text was the first part of the project. The text was written thinking about repetition, alliteration, so style figures, which are very relevant to create rhythm. So the rhythm of the text then was for Nicolas, who wrote the music, the material to create then the music and the rhythm of the music.
[00:09:48.165] Nicolas Blies: Yeah, exactly. And regarding the visual aspect of the piece, it was really, really very organic and very iterative. We finalized the last design maybe one month ago because it's very easy to do this design because we have a very organic process. So when we had the sound, the first good version of the sound, then we went through first the light animation on the connected garment. So it was a specific part of the creation, this animation on the connected garment. and then at the same time how we use this video mapping lights in connection with this connected garment because the piece is really a mix between this black and white design visuals and we play with the different forms and figures and the fact that these visuals are transformed in the space and this contrast with this very colorful light animation we had and the connected garments. So after we had the sounds, it was the second step for us was to play like choreographer, I mean, but with these different lights we had the connected garments and the video mapping projections.
[00:11:10.994] Stephane Hueber-Blies: It was really a kind of synchronization we wanted to do between the lights of the garments, the visuals, the text, the music, the sound design, etc. They all have to be synchronized and choreographic, so that's the main point of the project.
[00:11:27.045] Kent Bye: Yeah, in terms of developing the visuals, is this something that you were able to simulate virtually, like in Blender? Or is this something that you just set up and you have to look at it to see if you were using a certain projection? Because there's a lot of reflections and other stuff that are happening that I imagine might be difficult to fully simulate. But I'm just wondering about the practicalities as you're in your bedroom developing this.
[00:11:49.750] Nicolas Blies: It was very difficult first at the beginning to imagine what we can have in a space because it's difficult. So we did a lot of workshops, a lot of ateliers in which each time we did it we learned about how the visuals we created in our room on the computer how it lives in a real space. So it's just doing a lot of workshops, a lot of tests and then we learned and step by step we discovered what we loved and we did it like this.
[00:12:22.921] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yes, we had to choose a different kind of tissue for the projection. It's just the same if you have silk or cotton or something like that, it's different. So also the colors of the walls, everything has to make sense, obviously, but also has to make sense also in the reflection way. So it was super difficult to find the good balance between the colors of the lights, the tissues, the walls, etc. It was also a part of the synchronization we are looking for.
[00:12:53.925] Kent Bye: Yeah. And so, you know, in this piece, you're talking a lot about a lot of really intense topics of like childhood traumas. But then at the same time, there's a level of poetic abstraction that is a certain amount of distance from the visceral nature of those. And so I'm wondering if you could talk through the process of how to tell this story in a more indirect way, a more poetic way and more in a way that isn't as explicit.
[00:13:23.908] Stephane Hueber-Blies: This was our main difficulties we had at the beginning of the story because how are we going to tell an intimate story when we are two authors with two different kind of trauma. Nicolas' trauma was illness and my trauma was sexual abuse. So how you tell a story enough universal We saw different stories so we decided to have a kind of poetic approach to be sure that everyone can have a poetic approach without putting inside a specific trauma. This was super important for us and then we hope people can reappropriate the story and say okay maybe it's also my story.
[00:14:09.111] Nicolas Blies: The poetry approach was the DNA we wanted to have from the beginning. It was the only reason we wanted to do this piece. We wanted to do poetry, that's for sure. It's why? Because we love these things. Also because our last work was very political, was very engaged. It was documentary, journalism. social impact things, and after many years of working on this piece, we needed to create this poetry, we needed to spend the next two years in poetry things. Then, what was really important, I have my own story, Stéphane has his own story, but we discover by telling the stories to each other, we discover the same path, the same journey, the same traumatic journey. Even if it's not the same trauma, it's exactly the same process. of when you want to hide yourself, when you want to disappear, when you want to destroy yourself, when you start this reconciliation, etc. The different steps were exactly the same. And then we realized this thing. We said, OK, we can maybe tell this story through this perspective. finding the good balance between tell a story with a lot of symbolic approach, but also many concrete steps in which in a way everybody can say, okay, yeah, I can reconnect myself to this part of emotions.
[00:15:42.899] Kent Bye: I noticed that there was kind of a weaving in to when sometimes the sound and the visuals would be very much aligned and sometimes it would be like more in parallel with each other and maybe augmenting each other but not explicitly representing what was being said because there was a lot of like more kind of like what I read as like experimental film like Stan Brakhage type of aesthetics or was there any visual references or inspirations that you took for when you were designing like screen based film experimental film like effects?
[00:16:12.111] Stephane Hueber-Blies: It was also a long journey to choose the visuals. In the first months, we decided to do something very figurative. We wanted to... It was almost a kind of film. It was a cinema approach. So we had something very figurative with characters, with specific situations, etc. and background. And it didn't work because the text is quite strong and heavy. So it created a kind of repetition of what we are listening with what we are watching, etc. So it was not relevant at all. Yes, so we decided step by step to create something more. It's figurative also, but something more connected to the poetry we put in the text. It was this first step. So we chose this. How did we arrive to this?
[00:17:05.925] Nicolas Blies: Good question. It was very iterative. Things changed because at the beginning we wanted to create real animations because we wanted to have abstraction but with real animation. But one day we just tried to take footage, real footage we had, some family footage we had. This is the childhood sequence we have in the beginning. And these different sequences, we put it on a filter, on TouchDesigner, etc. So we work on it. And then we realized, okay, we don't need to do animations. We just need to take part of our lives, to take fragments of our memories, to take fragments of our sensations, and to put it with a specific filter, a specific design, black and white, because we love black and white design. And yes, I realized that now we have this link between the text and between the visuals. The visuals was not a repetition of the text. It was something we can, yes, and not only to enhance our perspective and our vision. So it was very iterative and then when we discovered this we continued to search for different footage and then we work with our children, we shoot films with them, we take the sound from our life. So we decided at this moment to take fragments of our life and to make them more abstract, sometimes more figurative, sometimes more abstract and to play with them.
[00:18:38.638] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Because there is something very important realized after a few months, the concentration of the participants. We have to keep them focused on the story because, as I said before, it's a very heavy text. You have to be focused on it. If you are not, it's a problem to follow the story. So we needed to have some visuals who are not able to disconnect you from the story. So visuals were to accompany you in the story but not distract you from the story. This was super difficult to do.
[00:19:11.104] Kent Bye: Yeah, I could see that more fragmented representations of those scenes that I guess in some ways represent different fragments of the body and trying to get back to that body wholeness throughout the theme of the piece. And so, you know, I think another big part of this is that, you know, it's not just one screen, it's actually three screens that you have kind of like a step function or a Z shape that has more of a... plane that's then 90 degrees and then another 90 degree turn so you end up having like a step shape but vertically and so you have like six different people can see it in different locations I find myself to go inside on the opposite side for where the projections were so the light was shining in on me and I could see how one of the side was reversed and the other side was there so you got some nice kind of interplay for how those were playing with each other and then I could see the other screen in the background but there was also a lot of light that was happening on the walls behind me and on my body. And so I thought, OK, I'm going to walk around just to see what it looks like from different perspectives. And it's actually quite unique from each of the different six perspectives. You managed to create kind of a unique flavor for how the light reflects and bounces off and what you can see, what you can pay attention to, who else you can see who's also there. We were wearing these sort of shawls that have like LED lights inside of it. So yeah, I'd love to hear you talk about like coming up with that architecture of that step function that allows this many different perspectives to be able to look at the same stuff, but get a different view on it.
[00:20:41.738] Stephane Hueber-Blies: You want to start?
[00:20:42.518] Nicolas Blies: Yeah, I can start. Once again, we did a lot of workshops to test because it's never easy to find the thing. But our first idea was to be like, you know, when you... When you do the laundry of your clothes, you know, you hang them on a line and you have sometimes these different lines with different clothes and as a child you walk like a labyrinth, yeah exactly. At the beginning we had this kind of fragment of childhood. So the first row of the scenography we did was this shim. So we try and we find some interesting things, sometimes it was much difficult because Manipulating video projector is really complicated because there is some technical stuff and when we are working with optical things it's always very very complicated but after doing many tests we simplify and like a minimalism approach you know we are like all the scenography is very minimalistic and we like where things are really proper very clean and very maybe straight I don't know We like when it's organic in a straight thing. We like this contrast. So yeah, finally we find that this scale, I don't remember how you... The step. The step, yeah, exactly. The step was the best figure for this specific space we have here in Venice. It was the best way to play with the walls because it offers exactly different perspectives. It offers a way for the people to move. And because we also tried to do a cube, but the cube was not a good idea because you start to watching the cube and you don't leave the space as a space. So we broke this cube and we create this step. And like you said, the walls are maybe the most interesting part of the visual approach. It's what I prefer. is when the light strikes the tissue and then when these pictures completely explode in the room. That is the most interesting part. So yes, it was very iterative and we tried many things but it was the best at the end, the best way to offer a different experience for each people because each people have his preferred place. You have yours because you did it, but other people say, oh, I prefer this place because I have a global overview. Some people prefer to lay down and to be very close of the screen because they feel more immersed. So it really depends on the people. And that was a good point.
[00:23:23.379] Stephane Hueber-Blies: It also gives you a different perspective on watching other people also. This is also interesting in our piece because that's what we wanted to do, to create different kinds of possibilities to watch the beauty of other people. So through the tissue, depending on where they are sitting or where you are sitting also, and through the tissue in the front of the wall. So you have different ways to watch others. And when you watch the other beauty, you watch your own beauty. That's what you wanted to do.
[00:23:54.778] Kent Bye: Yeah, and there's some very distinct pieces of cloth that we're wearing. They're like a shawl with LEDs that are embedded inside of it. And then, you know, we're all sitting there and all of a sudden, like the lights start in synchrony two at a time going through a certain sequence that connects two people. But it just was an opportunity for people to both be... performer of sorts of light as they're walking around with these shawls with lights inside of them, but also the audience of seeing other people that are dynamically having these lit up into different ways that you're really able to bring in a lot of color of something that is very black and white. And so wondering if you could talk to this process of like, did you develop these as custom or is this something that you found? And yeah, just this process of adding this splash of color with this kind of LED shawls.
[00:24:43.421] Nicolas Blies: It was, we wanted the people to be light. And this project is light poetry in a way, in different way, with the video mapping, but also with this connected garments. And when we decided to create this connected garments, We had different solutions to have this light, but also to add other things. But at the end, we decided to keep only the lights because we wanted, yes, to guide the gaze of the people to the others. And for us, lights were the best way to guide the gaze of the people and to create this beauty.
[00:25:26.168] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yes, with the lights of the government we can also create a kind of light choreography. It was important for us to create a kind of movement to put the people in movement even they are staying on the floor, watching the visuals or closing their eyes if they want. We wanted to create movement because it's also something very important. But I wanted also to say about the garments. At the beginning, yes, we also explored at the beginning the possibility also to use haptic technology. But it wasn't also relevant for us because we didn't want to create something ludic, playful. Again, for the concentration of our audience, it was super important. They are not able to play with something, with the lights or with... They have to be, in a way, the consequence of the beauty of the text and the music. They have to be the last part of this. The beauty of the text and the sound design has to reflect on their own beauty through the light of the garment. So they cannot be responsible at all of how... the light will work.
[00:26:33.385] Nicolas Blies: And this connected garment is not only a technological thing, it's firstly a beautiful garment with embroideries, with beautiful silk fabrics. We wanted to offer to the audience a beautiful garment not only a technological innovative garment on which you can play etc no it has read to be something handmade because it's handmade it's really craft it's really artisanal like we said in france So we really wanted to have these beautiful objects on your shoulders. It was important because we respect the people, we respect the bodies and we want that you have respect for yourself. So we wanted to give you something which is really respectful because it's really something well done.
[00:27:25.883] Stephane Hueber-Blies: And the garment will also protect every people of the audience because they all have the same garments, the same size. They won't be judged for their body. You can come with your body, it doesn't matter how it looks like. You have a garment who will protect you from any critic, etc., any judgment. This was super important for us to make all the people equal in our experience.
[00:27:50.461] Nicolas Blies: And finally, because the scenography is very minimalistic and very straight, we wanted, by contrast, to have this organic movement on your body, of course. So on the body we played with circles, with non-linear movements. Yes, we played by contrast with the rest of the piece.
[00:28:12.938] Stephane Hueber-Blies: And the lights of the garments are connected to the rhythm of the text and of course the music and the sound design. So he's not living alone. He's living through the rhythm of the alliteration, repetition of the text. So there is a big connection between the two of them. This is, yes, yeah, yeah.
[00:28:32.441] Kent Bye: Yeah, one of the challenges I had with taking in all of the piece was that because it was so inspiring visually that there was just so much of my brain cognitive load was paying attention to the beauty that sometimes it was hard to track each of the poetic nature of what was being said because I mean if I just sat me down and listened to just that It may took me two or three times of listening to it. I'm the type of person that takes a while to have to listen and re-listen to songs and like have people kind of break stuff down. So poetry is not my strong suit. So I feel like it's a certain affordance that I think can slip people into these more metaphoric thought patterns. But for me, I find it challenging to always track step by step. So I don't know if that's something that was intentional or if that was something that was also trying to add additional distance or Yeah, just how you start to navigate that.
[00:29:26.964] Stephane Hueber-Blies: As I said before, the concentration is super important for us. So we created, you don't remark it if you do this, but we created some memories hook in the lights, in the text, and in the music. And in the visuals also. You have different hooks, memories hooks, in different parts of the project, so if you are disconnected for some seconds or some minutes even on the story, the music will push you back in the story, or the lights, because we used exactly the same pattern a few minutes ago in a similar part of the story, or the music, or the sound design, etc. You have different hooks here. And the text also, the text for example was written using references like Bukowski for example or even I like to say Eminem because Eminem wrote his text using alliteration or repetition. He is very strong for that. So I did the same for the text. I did very strong repetition or alliteration through the text so people can easily get back in the story even if they were sometimes a little bit unfocused.
[00:30:42.562] Kent Bye: Is that alliteration in French and English or is it only in French?
[00:30:47.102] Stephane Hueber-Blies: That's a good question. I did it firstly of course in French and then after the translation was done I realized obviously there is not the same rhyme or the same sounds etc. So sometimes I rewrite the English version to make sure that there is the rhythm and also the rhymes sometimes inside the sentences will serve the audience to have these memories. So I rewrite some parts of the story.
[00:31:19.090] Kent Bye: Nice. So there's some moments that I remember at least like the LED garment having some like solid colors come in, like all same colors. And that seemed to be connected to like either chord shifts or music moments. And so maybe you could talk about this process of how you were using different splashes of color to amplify different moments within the piece.
[00:31:42.389] Nicolas Blies: Yeah, for sure. So the color was very important for us to play with. The color was really important. I think it was really linked to what we did with the music. I think when you create music, you have colors on your mind. So like we said before, we first created the sound. Then, so after we created the music, we tried different things, but it was obvious at certain sequences, the colors were really obvious. Orange at a specific moment when we tried to work with the pulsation. Of course, we have a preset which is called the red body because it's linked to the text because Stéphane was talking about a litter of bloods because it's a metaphor he did, etc., etc.
[00:32:28.877] Stephane Hueber-Blies: and then so we create a kind of different languages with the color languages and yes it's really linked to the memory and to the music also yeah the colors is also a way to have memories hooks as i said before using orange in this specific part of the story and then again in another part we'll for example at the beginning we have the childhood with a very peaceful moment etc so we use a specific colors And we are not going to use it again during the trauma part. But again, we are going to use it when we evoke the childhood again during the reconciliation, for example. So it looks a little bit simple, but it's very important because people easily can get back in the story using these colors also.
[00:33:18.453] Nicolas Blies: But I want to say that we are very intuitive creators. I mean, we create a lot of things, and sometimes we don't know why we like it, sometimes we don't know why we like it, but when we like something, when it works for us, okay, we keep it, and then we continue on another sequence, etc. And then, after we had different things we love, We start to make sense and we create to create the architecture. We start to create the contract with the audience in a way that we create a language. The first thing is really very intuitive. We try things, we are looking in our own emotions, in our own... Yes, it's very unconscious. But then when we have something we like, we start to create this language on this architecture.
[00:34:08.933] Stephane Hueber-Blies: It's definitely all about creating a language for us. When you start something to speak to people, when you don't know the language to speak with other people, you are not understandable. And then you say, maybe I have to say this like this, how it reacts, okay, it works, it doesn't work, okay, so I will reproduce it or not, or change it, etc. So we took some months, some years also sometimes, to create a language with different mediums, lights, visuals, music, text, colors, sounds, etc. And at the end, people understand you, I hope, a little bit.
[00:34:51.917] Nicolas Blies: And when we understood our own language, when it's clear for us, we go through the full piece and we check if all is understandable. Not understandable in a way of I have to understand, but understandable in a way if it makes sense for us, if it's logical, if our language makes sense for us.
[00:35:14.808] Kent Bye: In terms of either the story or the music, did you break it up into chapters? I'm just curious how, because the sounds sound like it was a pretty key part, but also the written text, and so just maybe talk about the structure of the piece.
[00:35:29.295] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yes, the text, because it's the beginning of the piece, respects the narrative arc globally, so the childhood, the trauma with the climax, etc., then kind of destruction, and then the reconciliation and the solution. so it's a kind of classic narrative arc and maybe with a kind of unbalance because it's not well balanced between different parts but doesn't matter and then you put the music on it using the same kind of narrative arc but in the music way but yes it's it's a very classic in my opinion maybe it's not but in my opinion it's very classic narrative arc but it was we did it on purpose yes
[00:36:12.694] Kent Bye: Yeah. And then the music, how did you translate the arc? Cause there's consonants and distance of different cores or, you know, what was your process of translating that into the music?
[00:36:24.420] Nicolas Blies: The first thing I did was to take my classical guitar and to find a melody I love. For me, the classical guitar is my transition object I reconcile with my body. I think the classical guitar was for me a way to reconcile myself with my body. Because when I touch him on my front, it's... So yeah, it was obvious for me to first create this first melody and to create this first melody I just took the part of the childhood. I just took this part because I started classical guitar when I was 12 years old and the story starts more or less at this moment. So yes, I just created this short melody and then we decided this first melody was linked to the childhood, to the mother, to the fusion you have with your body. Because in a way the music is very melancholic, we can say, I think, but the global project is a bit melancholic and poetry but melancholic. And it's all linked to the beauty we saw in the childhood moments. So for us, it was really important to create this pure beauty, simple and pure beauty through the classical guitar. And then for all the rest, I play with my synthesizer, with sampling, I sample my guitar, classical guitar, I play with the chords. I box with my guitar, I create some different sounds and then I sample it in a very electronic, very organic approach and I try to destroy myself through the sounds. And that's why all this auto-destruction part we have in the piece was really playful for me as a creator because I really tried to destroy my body just by pushing my sampling buttons and to create these electronic sounds. And then, like the full piece, when I had this different part of the music, at the end, I regroup all the things. I try to assemble and to create homogenic approach and memories. Of course, because this different leitmotif we have in music, a leitmotif is a short part of music you repeat at different moments. And this short music is linked to an idea or a character or something like this. So we have a melody for the childhood, we have a melody for the reconciliation, and we have also a legato with cello, three notes, very simple, but we use different moments in the piece to create this memory approach. And it creates this thing to, okay, something will happen. We can move forward. Okay, childhood is finished. Now we are going to the forest. Okay, now the forest is finished. Now we are moving forward to the auto-destruction part, etc. Because life is like this. Even what you are doing, you have to go from one moment to another one. You have no choice. You have to move forward. And this is also what we want to tell. We have to move forward. Even what happens in your life.
[00:39:26.038] Kent Bye: Yeah, and I wanted to ask one other production and then kind of give my sort of other thoughts on the piece. I noticed in the credits that you had the FI Centre as well as Lucid Realities, which is an interesting co-production between those two distributors. And FI Centre is doing a lot of stuff in Montreal with the different and also location-based entertainment projects. So yeah, I'd love to hear a little bit more about bringing on both the FI Centre and Lucid Realities in terms of whatever may happen after Venice Film Festival and taking this out because they're both kind of involved in that space of taking forth these LBE experiences.
[00:40:04.671] Stephane Hueber-Blies: We worked on this project since two and a half years and it was really something organic with iteration, even the production. In the first step, we are the co-founder of Eibann, so we developed the project into our own company, of course, in our own studio. And then we asked Lucide and Chloé Jarry to join us because we have a very good relationship with Chloé, very, very close. And we thought that maybe Chloé was also a good co-producer to work on our own intimacy. It was very important for us to have her also on board with Marion Guth from Eibann. We thought it was a good match. So we started to co-develop the project. on different levels, in an artistic way of course, but also in a financial way of course, but in an artistic way. Chloé was very helpful specifically to push us into something intimate, so we worked very well with her and Marion. And then, after a few months, we decided also to work with a studio in Montreal to explore the possibility to have, for example, interaction, an interactive point of view on the project. So we did some workshops there in Montreal to explore the possibilities of something more interactive in our piece. but after a while we recognized that interactivity isn't what we wanted to do for example walls interactivity or floors interactivity etc it wasn't what we wanted to do because again for the concentration it's something playful is something disturbing it doesn't work So we decided not to continue on the interactive possibilities we started to work on. And after a few months, we decided to go a little bit more quickly and a little bit more efficient to work only in our own studio in Luxembourg, Velvet Flair, with a branch also of IBAN in a way. to work with a very small team in exactly the way we wanted to do it. So without interactivity, without haptic, a very poetic approach, a very meditative, contemplative approach with two or three people. So with Damiano Picci, with our technical director, with Pierre Tacchi, the head of development, etc. who worked on the technology of the garment. And we worked, the three of us, with Davide also on the closing design, the four of us, and Marion as a producer, in a very small team, a very safe team, and we finished it in a few months, in some months.
[00:42:58.522] Nicolas Blies: And what we expect from Venice? We don't expect anything. In a way it was really our first challenge to be ready and we are very proud to present now this project here in Venice. It's really a good opportunity for us to present this work to the audience because The biggest challenge we have is how can we present this piece with this connected garment to the audience? Are we able to do nine presentations a day? Are we able to touch people with this piece? Because it's different, it's not with an headset approach, etc. So for us, Venice is really a way to try what we wanted to offer to the audience, to see their reaction, to see how they feel with the piece, if we had new things to change or not, if we found a good way. It's really a premium workshop, of course, very premium, but yes, it was really a way for us to be in contact with the audience.
[00:43:59.445] Stephane Hueber-Blies: At the beginning, when we arrived in Venice, when we knew that we are going to be in competition in Venice, we said to ourselves, okay, I don't have interactivity, I don't have optics, I'm only meditative poetry. Me, myself, but also you, me more, I think I was very anxious to come because I was... will the market react to such a piece, a very specific piece without headset at all. I was very afraid to come. And after two days now, I see maybe, what, 10 or 12 people crying, going out of the piece. They are all apparently very happy to do it. So I'm a little bit more confident in the way we did this project. But yes, at the beginning I was super afraid. So Venice was also a way to be sure I did a good choice.
[00:44:55.970] Kent Bye: Yeah, just watching the piece, I just felt like there was so many things that were being tied together, you know, from the lights and how it was reflecting, but also the LED garments and the narrative and the music. And yeah, I just felt like moments where someone's LED garment would light up and then the wall behind them would also turn that same color. And so there's this... real transmission of light as part of the art form which reminded me a lot of the light and space movement folks like James Turrell and others who are like using light as a medium and I feel like the light and space movement was very ambient and slow they were creating installation spaces that were very contemplative and maybe not very dynamic and changing. This is like a lot more dynamic in the speed and pace, but still it gives me that feeling that it's in this lineage of the light and space movement and folks like James Turrell. But I don't know if there was any other inspirations you took from artists like that.
[00:45:51.503] Nicolas Blies: It's very interesting because when we talked together yesterday and you mentioned James Turrell and the light and movement, Okay, I was wondering to myself, yes, you're right, for sure. And last night, I went through the mood board we did the last few months. And yes, I have in the mood board a Jamster World work. So yes, I'm happy that you see the link, but it was unconscious. Once again, we didn't start by saying, okay, I am inspired by the light movements, I'm inspired by Jamster World, etc., But yes, you're right. Of course, it's a light. We try to do poetry by lights, poetry by lights. And yes, you're right. It's meditative. It's contemplative. It's minimalist. It's slow, sometimes a bit faster. But yes, we wanted to play with lights. That's for sure. And yes, it's really interesting what you what you reveal.
[00:46:46.658] Kent Bye: Yeah, and I think it's something that I'm seeing more and more in projects of just how much that when you want to transport people into another reality, light is a great medium to start to convince people of different aspects of that reality and the fact that you're actually using the light in the projection map in these silk screens. And yeah, just the way the light was diffracting, it was just really quite stunning and beautiful. So it just was really awe-inspiring in a lot of different ways. So yeah.
[00:47:15.466] Nicolas Blies: I just wanted to add, by this play, by this game, colors, light and music, etc. I was very inspired also by Kandinsky, by picture things. Of course, it's not light, but as painters, they wanted to play with how we perceive the light. Or Kupka, for example, they play with how we can see the light. And I think at the end, it's what we wanted to do. And now we realize, because you mentioned it, You put your fingers on it, but yes, we are really touched by the feeling, by the immersion, by lights and colors and the link of the colors, lights and sounds. I mean sounds, music, voice and sound design.
[00:47:58.920] Kent Bye: There's actually a piece by Emissive here about the Impressionists, 1874, that is also around how the artists of that Impressionist era were trying to capture the quality of the light. So there's kind of like these light themes that are subtly making its way through. So, yeah, I guess as we start to wrap up, I'd love to hear what each of you think the ultimate potential of this type of immersive art and immersive storytelling might be and what it might be able to enable. For the distribution? No, just the ultimate potential. So like the future of like where this could go, what the endless possibilities might be. So yeah, just your thoughts on what might be possible. The ultimate potential.
[00:48:40.081] Nicolas Blies: What a question. What a question. For us, installation, location-based experience, I don't know if you continue to use this term or not, but for us, as creators, we need the space. We need... to feel our body in a space, in an immersive space. So I think this way, we can see since now two years, this movement of having more installation approach, I think it could be a good, interesting, a good way for the industry.
[00:49:13.354] Stephane Hueber-Blies: I don't know where it's going, but what I'm sure is that we worked on Ceci est mon coeur thinking about the distribution, so how we will be in contact with our audience. This is because in the first iteration of the piece, we had, for example, 30 video projectors, and we discussed with some art centers, museums, different places, etc. But I said, what can I do with 30 projectors? It's not possible. So we worked on the piece, thinking always about it. So I don't know what's the future of XR or what's going on here. But I'm sure we have to be connected to the audience, what they want and how we can catch them. It's all about it. But how? Good question.
[00:50:07.089] Nicolas Blies: I think the future is to continue to try new things. I think, as we did from the beginning, we wanted to do something a bit different. So I think if each creator does that, I think we can move forward. I mean, we don't have to reproduce things we saw and etc. I think we have to try to do a bit different and maybe the future will be written like this.
[00:50:31.971] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Obviously, but we also have to quit the underground things. We have to be connected now to the audience because if we are still in the underground, one day it will be finished. So we have to think how to catch it, but without losing the creative, the author's intention, etc. For me, the author's intention is super important. This industry needs authors, needs intention, not only playful playthings, etc., playing, gaming, etc. No, we need authors. This is the main part of the thing. If we have authors, real authors, talking about themselves, talking about the world, talking about the society, etc., giving some solution in their own way, we could achieve something. But we have to think about the form, how it could be. and how we can do all what I just said, catching people.
[00:51:27.959] Kent Bye: Is there anything else that's left unsaid that you'd like to say to the broader immersive community?
[00:51:34.589] Nicolas Blies: what can we say but keep trying no it's very exciting to see all this creation really and it's very inspiring and I think we have to continue all together to do like this because I'm sure that the audience are looking for something new for something different they are looking for new perspective so I think we are all in the good in the good in the good path in good way so let's continue like this
[00:52:01.798] Stephane Hueber-Blies: Yes, we met a lot of wonderful people with different ways to sing things and to explore and to use art and technology and mix it, etc. together. And yes, we have to try again and try again, try again and try again and to offer the best quality we can and to be exigent. I don't know if it's a good word in English. Exigent. To be very hard with ourselves to do the best. Yes, I think so. We have to keep fighting and to continue because it's a fight to impose this kind of new way to give storytelling in front of classic cinema, etc. We have to be proud of what we are going to do, what we are doing and to be sure that this is future.
[00:52:52.688] Nicolas Blies: It's beautiful to see this island here in Venice. It's so big. There are so many creations. The industry is growing each year. So I think it's really exciting. So we are in an exciting moment. So yes, continue like this. It's great.
[00:53:13.328] Kent Bye: Awesome. Well, Cici Moncure, and This Is My Heart. I really enjoyed this piece, and I think it's experimenting with a little bit more analog forms of the XR, with just light as poetry, as you said, and as the sound, and also poetry itself as the poetry. So yeah, I feel like your process of mixing all these different modalities together, coming up with something that I think really resonates with how each of these different parts are playing with each other, and kind of really building off each other. So yeah just really enjoyed it and uh yeah best of luck as you move forward and see where you take it here in the future so thanks again for joining me to help break it all down thank you thank you very much thanks again for listening to these episodes from venice immersive 2024 and uh yeah i am a crowd-funded independent journalist and so if you enjoy this coverage and find it valuable then please do consider joining my patreon at patreon.com slash voices of vr thanks for listening
