An Elegy for Immersive

There is an old Sanskrit word, Lila (Leela), which means play. Richer than our word, it means divine play, the play of creation and destruction and re-creation, the folding and unfolding of the cosmos. Lila, free and deep, is both delight and enjoyment of this moment, and the play of God. It also means love. Lila may be the simplest thing there is — spontaneous, childish, disarming. But as we grow and experience the complexities of life, it may also be the most difficult and hard won achievement imaginable, and it’s coming to fruition is a kind of homecoming to our true selves.

Stephen Nachmanovitch

Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art

Often art arrives in movements. Bauhaus architecture, abstract expressionism, French New Wave cinema, Beat poetry, punk rock to name a few from recent history. These movements appear like a wave; some artists are able to read the culture and position themselves to ride that swell. Others might see the wave and choose to swim against the current.

Rick Rubin

The Creative Act

If Immersive was truly an art movement, I’m not the first to observe its expiration date has passed.

When we began introducing meta-narratives into the public sphere, it was a far safer place to tinker with someone’s sense of reality. Now we live in a post-truth world, where it is increasingly difficult to verify a simple fact. We’ve seen the devastation this erosion of truth has had on society, and it seems powerful forces have appropriated our techniques.

If the term “immersive” were an escape room… there’d be no escape at all. If everything is immersive, then nothing is. The word itself has lost definition. There is no center.

Was there ever a true center? Yes, unquestionably. Though perhaps not a wholly integrated one. Here’s my theory; the highest heights of the Immersive Arts movement were fueled by a potent alchemical compound distilled beneath the long shadow of the shaman. This was the centrifugal force driving the movement.

The words shadow and shamanism seem altogether provident. As Jung observed, the shadow represents a hidden part of ourselves, the dynamic unconscious elements of both the individual and collective identity. The word shaman is also increasingly tarried about lately, as a psychedelic renaissance surges on. Some Western practitioners claim the title, while critics cry “foul”, citing inauthenticity or worse.

So, what’s a shaman, and what does it have to do with the demise of an art movement?

Shaman — noun

a person who acts as intermediary between the natural and supernatural worlds, using magic to cure illness, foretell the future, control spiritual forces, alter consciousness, etc.

If an artist conjures forth an entire story-world from their imagination, then invites people into that world, are they acting as a shaman? Consciously or not, they stand in a surrogate role to our shaman. What I’ve gleaned, at some expense, is that when playing in this psychically charged territory unconsciously, the shadow element inexorably presents itself.

My appeal is this: artists aren’t the enemy. Moments of breakdown are inevitable. Where there’s rupture, let there also be repair. Have difficult conversations directly, for goodness sake. And if you’ve taken the time to read this, hear my vow to remain wide open to any and all good-faith attempts at dialogue.

Before stepping any further, let’s consult our map. Here we see; a strong dose of upheaval is necessary in order for transformation to occur. Otherwise, to our detriment, we’d stay in the same place. We must allow things to decay or die in order to create space for something new.

What would something new look like? What are these times calling for?

If the central narratives of nonchalance had one theme in common with most immersive projects of the zeitgeist, it was an appeal to the numinous. We shared in grand gestures toward the mystical, metaphysical, ethereal, and otherworldly. Hidden just beneath the surface of everyday life, magic was waiting to be engaged with and brought to life. This conceit was the central premise of nonchalance, and I believe, the immersive arts movement as a whole.

The impulse was not misguided, but perhaps unfinished. How could it be followed through? What would happen if we took Magical Realist Meta-Fiction, and fully authenticated it?

Let’s imagine the following statements are not fictional at all…

You really do have an ulterior persona. There is a rich hidden history of culture and spirit, lost to generations, waiting to be rediscovered. There are enigmatic forces at play, and when we become conscious of them, mystical synchronicities occur. There are dark forces to be confronted, looming largely within ourselves. The cave we fear to enter holds the treasure we seek. This treasure doesn’t look or feel anything like we imagined; it is far more exquisite. You’ve found direct access to a well of power and inspiration, as benevolent forces coalesce around you. Fellowship awaits in full support of your odyssey, for we can not do it alone. All was lost. Then found anew. Every moment was worth it.

What I’m proposing is; this story is nonfiction.

We manifested magical fictions in the civic realm because of a naive but instinctual pull toward the sacred aspects of life. Affinity with spirit was coming through the work; an insistent urge to seek and find something more. Creators the world over built grand spectacles appealing, however obliquely, to an inner part of ourselves that is both ancient and eternal. We gathered techniques and tools to build spaces for people to participate in an imaginary mystical realm, a world inside a world. It took the entire adventure, failure and all, for me to wake up to the truth of what had been attempted.

These fictions were a comfortable placeholder for the true odyssey now facing our species. As the curtains dropped on our entertainments, we found ourselves in a civilization adrift, atop a spinning globe in acute peril, at the center of an astounding cosmos awaiting our full engagement. Alternative realities became obsolete the moment reality itself shattered beyond recognition. A deeper call-to-action has presented itself.

In facing these challenges, the following resources will be requisite: our deepest heart, soul, and imagination. The creative task will be to imagine and cultivate a new humanized center around which we may assemble. We’ll need to draw new maps for an ever changing terrain. Here story, song, and movement are called for in preservation of ancestral wisdom. You will become that ancestor. As such, we shall face harrowing levels of risk & reward. The beating of the drum will sound as faithful guides lead us through our own resistance, beyond the veil, and safely to the other side.

Call it Immersive Nonfiction, Realist Magic, or the conscious kin of the shaman. This is all to conjure our deepest selves in response to the factual circumstances of our times. It would be a far stretch for me to announce the next direction in participatory arts, or suggest others will follow along such a path. I am here to report what I see, and what I sense is needed, and share where I’m being called to work.

My thesis is that the impulse to build an imaginary story world was not misguided, but just one brief phase in a longer process leading toward a higher ineffable truth. We are now being summoned to use the very same resources we used to build meta-fictions, and leverage them to cultivate authentic moments of human passage, which serve to empower us in rising to a most auspicious occasion. This occasion is our own finality.

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