Spotlight: 'Refuge' VR Documentary about Refugees
As exhibited at the 'Supporting Syria & the region' conference, 'Refuge' VR documentary gives viewers a glimpse into the experiences and thoughts of Syrian refugees in Lesvos, Greece. It is a message of hope which encourages compassion and empathy.
Refuge is an emotionally documentative virtual reality experience shot in Lesvos, Greece during November 2015, using the communication of experiential VR and music to give a message of hope. It's constructed with the sights, sounds and emotions experienced whilst there, creating a form dubbed 'emotional experiential journalism'. We wanted to give people a glimpse into the experiences and thoughts that refugees felt in Lesvos but without using speech or text, as the complex emotions transcend these communication methods of our minds. It is a message of hope which encourages compassion and empathy rather than the message of coercion, guilt, shame or sorrow that are so often targeted with agencies in this situation which leads to sympathy at best, or despondency or desensitisation.
Pure and beautiful altruistic humanity is currently resonating throughout the island of Lesvos; this piece is an attempt to capture this essence.
Three days after exhibiting 'Refuge' at the Supporting Syria conference at Melia White House, London in 2016, the UK government significantly increased aid to the crisis.
'Refuge' VR was produced by Dr. John Holder in 2015, the CTO from Kinetic Art Labs.
Just some of the 'death jackets' that were dumped - many of the lifejackets sold to the refugees did not meet international safety standards and some were fake and filled with materials that would sink, not float. They were reportedly being sold for $1000.
Inflatable boats were cut in half so they could not be reused, making more money for traffickers and potentially avoiding return crossings to rescue more people stranded on the shores of Turkey.
Boats were shipwrecked by traffickers to avoid reuse.
The VR experience was shown at the 'Supporting Syria & the region' conference, following from the World Economic Forum 2016 with many of the same decision makers and UK government in attendance.
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