Muted

VOLUMETRIC VR EXPERIENCE

2020

A fall through silence

She no longer speaks. Every day, she hides by the old stone wash-house to gaze into the bottom of the large pool. Through the reflections in the water, she slowly lets herself sink along the thread of her illusions, down to the depths of herself.

Muted is an immersive and sensitive experience that plunges you below the surface of a young girl’s silence, into an imaginary and poetic underwater world. Parental abandonment has left her voiceless. This is a story beyond words, one that is felt rather than told. Like a freediver, you gently descend along a line connecting you to the surface. This story-line will guide you down to the depths. Flowing through the thoughts and memories of this world of silence, ocean currents sometimes create strange dances like an imaginary sign language.

“I was personally very impressed by its artistic quality and moved by the poetry it conveys.”

Hugues Vinet
Director of Innovation and Research Means, IRCAM CENTRE POMPIDOU PARIS

“This sensitive narrative experience has met with remarkable success among those attending the event (general public as well as professionals).”

Marialya Bestougeff
Director of Innovation at CENTQUATRE-PARIS

Fall along the story-line

At first, the story in this virtual reality experience takes shape on the table at which the participant is seated. A scaled-down universe comes to life in front of them: they can look closer, or even peer behind objects.

Muted is not a 360-degree movie, but an immersive experience (or “6 DoF”) that allows for full integration within the virtual environment.

The story then continues in an infinitely vast underwater world. The participant’s descent into the depths is set to an original music composition. The sound design evolves as they sink lower and lower, deepening the immersion.

Virtual world takes shape on the table

Muted Experience setup

Muted Young girl alone in labyrinth

Muted setup Headset HTC VIVE PRO on table

Virtual world alone school

Muted Setup map

THE EXPERIENCE

Duration: 10 minutes (seated)
Family-friendly (>10 years old)
Comfortable experience
Languages: English / French
Other: may be subtitled

A choreographed sign language

In the depths, the viewer witnesses a choreography of particles swirling in the currents. These currents are created by the movements of a near-invisible dancer. Only the speed and shape of her motions are preserved, materialized by millions of particles.

This dance is a choreographed sign language, using the medium of the body to address the theme of muteness.

Expressing silence through vibration. Vibration as «silent sound».
Vibration, the reverberation of a former presence.

In this piece, vibratory phenomena are given a visual form. By producing vibrations, the particles resonate and bind with one another, forming lines before scattering in the currents. It’s as though the movements of the body went on ringing soundlessly, leaving behind them traces of past gestures. In these traces, the feeling of absence settles in.

Choreographed sign langage particles lines

Choreographed sign langage particles lines vibrations

Volumetric Studio

A collaboration with the Fraunhofer HHI research center in Berlin allowed us to carry out the volumetric capture of a dance performance. The choreographed sign language, made up of particles, was created out of the performer’s 3D pointclouds.

Volumetric Studio Fraunhofer HHI

Volumetric Studio Fraunhofer HHI dancer

AGENDA

LUMEN#8 - Centre de la Marionnette FWB
Tournai / Belgium
October 13 to 15, 2023

ULTRAMARIN Festival / Tana Art Space
Venice / Italy
September 1 to 8, 2022

ULTRAMARIN Festival / VRHAM
Hamburg / Germany
June 2 and 3, 2022

La Mécanique du Trait / Le Grenier à Sel
Avignon / France
April 2 to June 25, 2022

Nuit des Arts Numériques / Maison Folie
Mons / Belgium
November 20 & 21, 2021

ECV / Creative Schools - Muted Experience + WORKSHOP
Aix-en-Provence / France
November 2 to 5, 2021

Les réalités alternatives / CHRONIQUES PRODUCTION / 6MIC
Aix-en-Provence / France
May 27, 2021

ULTRAMARIN Festival / Electrotheatre Stanislavsky
Moscow / Russia
From April 22, 2021
to April 25, 2021

ON - ARLES / Espace Van Gogh
Arles / France
From October 03, 2020
to October 25, 2020

STARTS Residencies days / LE CENTQUATRE-PARIS
Paris / France
From February 28, 2020
to March 1, 2020

STARTS residency / Fraunhofer HHI research institute
Berlin / Germany
From september 02, 2019
to september 27, 2019

// First version //

Interstice
Caen / France
From April 26, 2019
to May 12, 2019

Printemps Numérique / KANAL Centre-Pompidou
Brussels / Belgium
From March 23, 2019
to March 24, 2019

Chroniques - Biennale des imaginaires numérique
Aix-en-Provence / France
From November 10 ,2018
to December 9, 2018

Credits

Created by

Christophe Monchalin

Programming & Graphic Design

Christophe Monchalin

Choreography & performance (volumetric capture)

Léonore Guy

Interpretation & Sign language (180° movie capture)

Maud Chapoutier

Illustration

Tomoko Yoshida
Christophe Monchalin

2D Animation

Evelien de Roeck
Tomoko Yoshida

Original music

Yann Deval

Voice

Léonore Guy

Translation

Matthieu Millou

Additional devs & Design V1 Prototype

Gauthier Roumagne

External Contribution

Vjasterix : Particle Flowfields
Vincent Houze : FlexChop

Co-production

STARTS program of the European Commission
Fraunhofer HHI - Vision and Imaging Technologies / Content4All
Chroniques 2018 – International digital art biennal
Supported by the Région Sud
Coordination : Seconde Nature et ZINC.
Edis - fonds de dotation, Octobre Numérique and Le Liberté.
With the help of Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles
and Wallonie-Bruxelles international

With the help of

Studio Joanie Lemercier
La Maison des Cultures et de la Cohésion Sociale de Molenbeek-Saint-Jean
Le BRASS – Centre Culturel de Forest
La Maison du peuple, Commune de Saint-Gilles
Le Centre culturel Bruxelles Nord - Maison de la création
La Raffinerie / Charleroi Danse

Thanks

Studio Joanie Lemercier, Juliette Bibasse, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Peter Eisert,
Dr.-Ing. Anna Hilsmann, Fraunhofer HHI team, Dominique et Gérard Monchalin,
Rachid Semahi, Matthieu Millou, Brigitte et Bernard Gautraud,
Marie Gautraud, Nicolas Marty, Manon Brûlé, Emmanuelle Nicot,
Cédric Bourgeois, Holly et Silyn, Charles Bruere, Alice Perret, Le Créahm.

Logos

CONTACT

muted.vr@gmail.com