XR Ulysses: addressing the disappointment of cancelled site-specific re-enactments of Joycean literary cultural heritage on Bloomsday

Abstract

ABSTRACT Site-specific performances are shows created for a specific location and can occur in one or more areas outside the traditional theatre. Social gathering restrictions during the Covid-19 lockdown demanded that these shows be shut down. However, site-specific performances that apply emergent and novel mobile digital technologies have been afforded a compelling voice in showing how performance practitioners and audiences might proceed under the stifling constraints of lockdown and altered live performance paradigms, however they may manifest. Although extended reality (XR) technologies have been in development for a long time, their recent surge in sophistication presents renewed potentialities for site-specific performers to explore ways of bringing the physical world into the digital to recreate real-world places in shared digital spaces. In this research, we explore the potential role of digital XR technologies, such as volumetric video, social virtual reality (VR) and photogrammetry, for simulating site-specific theatre, thereby assessing the potential of these content creation techniques to support future remote performative events. We report specifically on adapting a real-world site-specific performance for VR. This case study approach provides examples and opens dialogues on innovative approaches to site-specific performance in the post-Covid-19 era.