2020, Virtual Reality
Presented in collaboration with The Guardian
Watch here
Ai Weiwei’s first virtual reality artwork, brings together two videos: Displaced Working Elephants in Myanmar and Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh – and gives viewers an intimate view of the uprooted, both animals and humans, as they experience various forms of displacement. The 360° immersive video places the viewer alongside the former working elephants in Myanmar, and within a refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, the world’s largest refugee settlement, in Bangladesh.
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Tech specs
Original version: 360º video
Director's cut: 40 Mins
Exhibition cut: 13 Mins
Hardware: Meta Quest
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Exhibition list
2022
Terrible Beauty at Humboldt Forum, Berlin (Group Exhibition)
2020
Guardian Live, London

2018, Virtual Reality
Anish Kapoor’s first virtual reality work, Into Yourself, Fall (2018), takes users on a journey through the human body, experiencing the sensation of falling into yourself via the immersive headset. Kapoor’s work seeks to simulate vertigo as a descent inside the human body, depicting a labyrinth of the inner workings of the self.
Starting the journey in a forest scene, in a clearing surrounded by trees, viewers encounter a large black void in the ground. Users then travel through a complex series of tunnels with walls that appear to be made of sinewy flesh and muscle. With this work, Kapoor invites users to experience a surreal sensation of exploring the unknown, with viewers losing themselves in another realm.
Working with Acute Art to design this custom made virtual space, Kapoor’s work was developed around the idea of creating a physical experience via a virtual journey, testing the limits of what is possible to experience through the technology. Into Yourself, Fall (2018) plays with the experience of wearing the headset, creating a disorientating sensation of radical introspection that is experienced physically by the viewer.
Kapoor’s use of this new technology enables him to explore materiality in a virtual realm, drawing on his highly influential sculptural practice to evoke both tactility and transcendence. With a soundtrack created by the artist’s son Ishan Kapoor, Into Yourself, Fall (2018) directly transports the viewer into the artist’s own visceral virtual reality.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended to: 360º video
Duration: 11 Mins
Hardwares: HTC Pro, Meta Quest
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Exhibition list
2021
Hyperrealities at ArtScience Museum, Singapore
2020
Waddesdon Manor, United Kingdom
Electric at Museum Ludwig (Group exhibition)
2019
Electric at Frieze NY (Group exhibition)
Beat Film Festival, Moscow (Group exhibition)
CorpArtes, Chile (Group exhibition)
2018
Hong Kong Art Basel with Marina Abramovic and Anish Kapoor (Group exhibition)
2017
Brilliant Minds, Sweden

2019, Virtual Reality
Antony Gormley and Dr. Priyamvada Natarajan’s first virtual reality collaboration, Lunatick (2019), uses data collected by NASA to map a real and interactive journey, leaving Earth to pass through atmosphere, stratosphere, the asteroid belt, and into outer space. This immersive experience treats the body as a vessel, free from gravity, in order to bring the haptic experience of space alive.
Wearing an immersive headset, viewers begin their journey on the deserted island of Kiritimati (Christmas Island) in the Pacific Ocean – an island which, due to rising sea levels, is in danger of disappearing. After discovering a launch pad in amongst a cluster of palm trees, the user’s body falls upwards through the clouds and into outer space.
The user will then explore the intricate landscape of the cosmos by circumnavigating the globe and catching a glimpse of the Northern Lights, before arriving on the Moon. Users are invited to explore its vast surface and gravitational force, as only twelve men previously have done.
From the moon, the viewer is thrown further into space, past the shimmering surface of the Milky Way, towards the heart of the solar system – the Sun – where they are eventually met by a blinding white light, marking the end of the piece.
To produce the artwork, Acute Art used multi-scale modelling to recreate tiny elements such as flowers and colossal objects like the Sun. One of the most significant challenges was to create an optical sensation of the real size of an object, within the infinite scale of the cosmos.
By exploring the cosmic realities at the heart of Dr Natarajan’s research, Gormley was able to take his lifelong investigation of the-body-in-space into another dimension. On VR, Gormley explains, ‘[it] is the latest tool to extend our consciousness imaginatively beyond the limits of our bounding condition and realise our cosmic identity.’
On the project, Dr Natarajan states, ‘I have always wanted to share the magic and majesty of the universe in a more intimate experiential way and this project Lunatick (2019) with Antony Gormley and Acute Art provided an exciting opportunity for just such a unique voyage of exploration.’
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Duration: 12 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro
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Exhibition list
2023
Chengdu Biennale, China
2021
A Outra Realidade at Farol Santander São Paulo, Brazil (Group exhibition)
Multimedia Art Museum Moscow, Russia (Group exhibition)
2019
Lunatick, The Store X, 180 The Strand, London
Moody Center for the Arts, Houston
The Theatre of Virtuality at Phi Immersive, Venice Biennale, Italy (Group exhibition)

2019, Virtual Reality
Bjarne Melgaard’s virtual reality artwork takes the viewer on a journey to the farthest reaches of the dark web. Melgaard compares the experience to taking Dimethyltryptamine (DMT), a naturally occurring drug, which is produced by a gland in the brain. DMT is considered the strongest hallucinogenic chemical substance and is found in almost every living organism on earth.
Melgaard’s work is influenced by authors Stig Sæterbakken, David Benetar and Paul Ehrlich; The Sofa: A Moral Tale, a 1742 libertine novel by Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon; and, Black Metal band, Darkthrone. Featuring characters that have recurred in the artist’s practice for over 25 years, including Lightbulb Man and Octo, in addition to new mutants and personalities created in collaboration with Acute Art, My Trip is a strikingly stimulating visualisation of the illusions of a DMT experience.
Beginning with the idea of suicide as an existential question, new psychedelia, and the loss of the self within a DMT trip, this work asks questions regarding life and how we choose to live it whilst introducing Melgaard’s perspective on Anti-Natalism and over-population. The artist is raising the contradictory view that if we are to continue to exist, humans will have to cease to procreate, as a result of the carbon impact of producing new human life.
My Trip also explores the abyss of the technological underground, the endless information consumed every day and the feeling of apathy and dullness that this technology consequently produces.
The work is accompanied by a soundtrack created specifically for My Trip by Melgaard’s long-time collaborator Romina Cohn.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended version: 360º
Duration: 12:30 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Meta Quest
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Exhibition list
2023
Outernet Arts, London
British Film Institute, London
2020
Frieze New York Viewing Room, (Online/Worldwide)
Sundance Film Festival, Utah
2019
Julia Stoschek Collection, Berlin

2020, Virtual Reality Installation / Virtual Reality
Beijing-based artist Cao Fei’s first virtual reality work, produced by Acute Art, is entitled The Eternal Wave. This work follows the artist’s previous immersive digital works such as RMB City (2007) created and executed in the online 3D virtual world, Second Life.
An ongoing exploration of virtuality, reality and the perception of self in relation to technology, Cao Fei’s work expands on themes of automation, labour and domesticity.
A deeply immersive experience, visually and literally, the viewer becomes drawn into the deeper realms of the artist’s creative universe. An interactive VR work, the viewer is a participant and player – acting out a role in the artist’s production.
Using the spaces of the Beijing Hongxia Theatre’s kitchen as its backdrop, the experience begins in a physical rendition the kitchen. The space is a stage set that the artist designed for her film, Nova (2019), which was based on the theatre’s original kitchen.
From this starting point, the visitor embarks on a multi-sensory journey through various portals, traversing the boundaries between time and space to explore the computers of the early electronics industry in China and the areas in and around the Hongxia Theatre.
The title of the work is taken from the 1958 Chinese film directed by Wang Ping, which focuses on the story of an underground CPC telegrapher- a key reference within Nova.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended version: AR
Duration: Unlimited (Interactive)
Hardware: HTC Pro, Smartphone
Extras: kitchen installation
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Exhibition list
2024
My City is Yours, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Australia
2023
Cao Fei: the future is not a dream, Pinacoteca Contemporânea, São Paulo, Brazil
2022
Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present, United Arab Emirates
2021
Cao Fei: Staging the Era, UCCA, Beijing, China
Cao Fei: Supernova, Maxxi, Rome, Italy
Cao Fei: The Eternal Wave, M+, Hong Kong
2020
Blueprints, Serpentine Gallery, Londo, UK

2018, Virtual Reality
Christo and Jeanne-Claude are celebrated for their ambitious structures that intervene landscapes around the world. The London Mastaba is Christo’s first major public work in the UK.
Acute Art is a technical partner for today’s most compelling artists, and to mark the launch of our app we collaborated with the Serpentine Gallery and the Royal Parks to bring the structure to life in virtual space. Our recording of The London Mastaba has made it an experience accessible anywhere in the world.
Christo developed his ideas for this piece with the environment in mind, connecting it to the lake and the surrounding city. Filming commenced at dawn in Hyde Park, with a 360º video camera attached to a drone. The sunrise hit the blue, red, and mauve barrels forming reflections on the surface of the lake. These colours are in striking contrast to the greenery of the park. The drone captured the incredible texture and patterns of the barrels as it flew around the structure.
On the app, fly across the lake looking down upon the structure from a height of 35 meters, surrounded by the natural sounds of the park, the wind and birds, catching a glimpse of London’s horizon.
The interactive virtual reality version allowed viewers to soar above it in virtual space at a height of 30 metres, revealing the work at different times of the day, from sunrise to sunset. Viewers can also explore the surrounding park, walk across The Serpentine Lake, and even climb to the top of Christo’s work.
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The London Mastaba (2016-18) is a temporary, floating sculpture consisting of 7,506 barrels, stacked horizontally on a floating platform. Situated on The Serpentine Lake in London’s Hyde Park, the work is the largest public work by Christo ever presented in the UK.
The installation stands at 20 metres in height, with blue, mauve and red barrels forming slanted walls that rise from a platform measuring 30 x 40 metres.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC) and 360º (Drone)
Duration VR: Unlimited
Duration 360º (Drone): 3:50 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Smartphone/Oculus Go
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Exhibition list
2020
The London Mastaba AR (Hyde Park), London
2018
Serpentine Gallery Beijing: Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Beijing, (China)

2022, Virtual Reality
Conceived by Stolpe Publishing and Acute Art
The Temple is a new virtual reality experience that invites visitors into the spiritual world of esteemed Swedish artist and mystic, Hilma af Klint.
A devotee of esoteric Christianity and member of several spiritual and occult movements, af Klint dreamt of a spiral-shaped building to house her most important works. Inspired by the teachings of legendary German mystic Christian Rosenkreuz, she wished it to be built on an island in Sweden but the idea never materialised, and the temple remained an imaginary creation – until now. More than a century later, af Klint’s vision has been brought alive through the power of technology in the form of an immersive 360º VR experience that will take visitors on a cosmic journey from the milky way, through enigmatic spirals in nature and into the artist’s most important paintings.
Hilma af Klint (1862 – 1944) is one of Sweden’s most prolific artists, known for her large-scale abstract botanical and occult paintings. Widely regarded as a major artistic innovator and visionary, her 2019 exhibition ‘Paintings For The Future’ was the Guggenheim’s highest-ever attended exhibition in the museum’s history.Gallery and the Royal Parks to bring the structure to life in virtual space. Our recording of The London Mastaba has made it an experience accessible anywhere in the world.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended version: 360º
Duration: 12 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Meta Quest
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Exhibition list
2023
Hilma af Klint, Fotografiska, New York
2022
Hilma af Klint, KOKO, London
Hilma af Klint, Swedenborg House, London
Hilma af Klint, Swiss Institut, Paris
Hilma af Klint, Outernet, London

2019, Virtual Reality
Louisa Clement’s Aporias (2019) derives its title from the Ancient Greek for an impasse or state of puzzlement, used in philosophy to denote a question that evades response. The work continues the German artist’s interest in real and artificial bodies, and automatons, translating her celebrated photographic work into virtual reality.
In the experience, the viewer sits at a table and chair that are replicated in Clement’s virtual environment, collapsing the division between the real and tangible, and the artificial. Using VR equipment, the viewer joins a group of three artificial digital bodies that resemble faceless mannequins – a regular feature of Clement’s photography.
Clement’s virtual mannequins are animated and use artificial intelligence to speak to each other and, occasionally, to the viewer, who is invited to interact with them and start conversation. Each mannequin is unique in appearance and personality, and all have the capacity to learn, acquire language, and lie. Every exchange they have will be unique, and no visitor will experience the same conversation.
Through Aporias (2019), Clement engages in an ongoing discourse around artificial intelligence and machine learning, reiterating unanswered questions regarding the potential for robots and computer programming, and the limits of human beings.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (Oculus Go)
Duration: Unlimited
Hardware: Oculus Go
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Exhibition list
2023
The Infinite Body, Rabat Gan Museum of Art, Israel
2022
L’année dernière à Malmaison, SAC, Bucharest
2019
Louisa Clement: Remote Control, Spengel Museum, Hannover
VR: The New Laws of Art, Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow (Group exhibition)
Louisa Clement: Remote Control, Ludwig Forum Aachen, Germany

2019, Virtual Reality
Based on his 2012 work Creation (Megaplex), video installation artist Marco Brambilla’s first virtual reality artwork is set between the birth and death of the universe and all that pop culture created during its existence. Modelled on DNA strands, this universal vortex travels in the form of a comic pullback, with the viewer ultimately witnessing the world implode before the spiral loops back to the moment of origin.
Based in London, Brambilla is primarily known for his elaborate re-contextualizations of found imagery, often employing new technologies in his work, having pioneered the use of 3D technology in video art.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended to: 360º
Duration: 8:30 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Meta Quest
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Exhibition list
2023
Outernet Arts, London, UK

2023, Virtual Reality
Exploring the technical developments shaping the world around us and society’s transformation by the internet and advancing technologies, Mark Leckey’s first virtual reality artwork isproduced using point cloud visualisation to create a dark and dreamlike experience. Working in VR, Leckey fosters a deeper experiential connection with the audience, as the viewer delves into the memories, both real and fabricated, of the artist.
Mark Leckey is one of the most significant artists to emerge in the 1990’s with Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999), the seminal video work that announced his arrival. Winner of the Turner Prize in 2008, Leckey works at the intersection of visual art and pop culture, seeking to connect to the audience through shared memory and experience, beginning with his own.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended to: 360º
Duration: 13 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Meta Quest
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Exhibition list

2018, Virtual Reality
It Will End in Stars (2018) is an immersive virtual reality experience combining Nathalie Djurberg’s distinctive sculpted figures with black and white charcoal drawings, text, and an unsettling soundtrack by Hans Berg.
The work is a continuation of Djurberg’s interest in archetypal landscapes, evoking fairy tales first encountered in childhood. Viewers begin their journey deep in a forest, entering a clearing to discover a wooden cabin. Inside, a wolf sits in front of a glowing fire – the building’s chintz interior undercut by a creeping sense of unease. Hand-written text, which appears hanging in mid-air, conveys the wolf’s thoughts, merging digital technology with an aesthetic closer to silent cinema. He describes the virtual environment as the ‘shadowside’, delivering a confession that merges themes common in Djurberg’s practice; fear, guilt and animalistic impulse.
Painstakingly scanned and animated, Djurberg’s creature is responsive, meeting the viewer’s gaze and responding to their movements. The effect is disconcerting; we are uncomfortably aware of our status as watched intruder. Around the room, objects become portals into alternate dimensions: a skull becomes a route into a kaleidoscopic environment, while a shadowy enclave of the cabin opens out into a cavernous animated temple. This dream-like vision ends in a sprawling star-scape, removing any sense of time and space through a suggestion of infinity.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Extended to: 360º
Duration VR: Unlimited
Duration 360º: 4 Mins
Hardware: HTC Pro, Oculus Go
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Exhibition list
2023
Dream Machines, DESTE Foundation, Greece (Group Exhibition
Tremulations, Swedenborg House, London, UK
2020
Julia Stoschek Collection (Berlin), Germany
Electric at Museum Ludwig (Cologne), Germany
2019
Beat Festival, MAMM, (Moscow), Russia, (Group exhibition)
Phi Centre (Venice), Italy (Group exhibition)
Phi Centre (Montreal), Canada (Group exhibition)
Schirn Museum Kunsthalle, (Frankfurt), Germany
Electric, Frieze NY (Group exhibition)
Electric, HFBK (Hamburg), Germany (Group exhibition)

2017, Virtual Reality
Olafur Eliasson’s Rainbow generates an ephemeral natural phenomenon – a rainbow – through interactive digital processes.
Viewers enter an immersive environment, encountering a fine curtain of softly falling water through which light passes. Just as a rainbow only appears when light, water droplets, and the eye are in alignment, so Eliasson’s virtual rainbow can only be seen when the viewer’s movement produces a correlation between these three points. Its coloured light slips in and out of view, responding to the viewer’s body as well as handheld controls, which allow direct interaction with droplets as they descend.
Rainbow is conceived to offer viewers an experience that is both intimate and social: multiple users are invited to join each other in a virtual space, regardless of where they access the work geographically. Each of their interactions with the falling droplets is visible to others, enabling viewers to recognise each other’s presence, and move in virtual space in full view of their co-participants.
Eliasson’s long-term interests in the relation between self and other and between self and surroundings have profoundly informed this new artwork, with the multi-participant function being a key feature that paves the way for new spaces for and of art in VR.
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Tech specs
Original version: VR (HTC)
Duration: Unlimited and Multi-player
Hardware: HTC Pro
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Exhibition list
2019
Phi Centre, (Venice), Italy (Group exhibition)
Phi Centre, (Montreal), Canada (Group exhibition)
2018
The Wrong S, (São Paulo), Brazil (Group exhibition)
CPH:DOX, Copenhagen, Denmark

VR artworks