(endless) Wall
| Director | Michael Takeo Magruder |
| Year | 2020 |
| Running time | |
| Dialogue | No Dialogue |
| Country | United States |
| Genre | VR |
| Synopsis | In this age, new industrial and communication technologies have the potential to extend human creativity and provide numerous benefits within our everyday lives. Although such technologies can engender an open and enabled society, these mechanisms are often implemented in processes of restriction and control. From the proposed US Southern Border Wall to the growing number of firewalls that restrict what citizens can see online, governments and corporations often seek to surround us with impassable barriers under the guise of ‘protection’ and ‘security’.
(endless) Wall is an algorithmically generated virtual environment into which a single individual can venture. Upon entrance, the user is confronted by a wall that spans into the distance, whilst behind them a barren ground dissipates into a void. The wall is impassable. As the individual journeys along its base there is never a break in the structure or a means to transverse the barrier. At regular points, small openings like narrow slits of a prison cell allow the individual to gaze into the space that lies beyond. The view is not of a utopia, but only another wall – imposing and unbroken like the first. In the distance, a soft light emanates from the sky and stretches across the horizon while the faint sound of unseen songbirds echoes through the air. The passage of time is recorded only by quickly vanishing rays of light and the constant movement of the clouds above. We sense the notion of a better place (perhaps a better life), but we cannot reach it. |