Highlights
Story

Through the doors awaits a cavernous chamber resembling a research laboratory. Inside a phalanx of clear capsules, a handful of humanoid figures reside—yet at this stage, it’s unclear whether they are human or humanoid. A web of wires extends from their skin, apparently transmitting data of some kind. As if in response to an electrical stimulus, they wriggle and writhe, ever so faintly.

There is a large command center in the middle of the room, busily controlled by operators clad in costumes suggestive of white medical scrubs. Data, icons, images, and texts stream across a series of screens on the wall. The text reads as the results of an experimental test, or perhaps a prophetic revelation. Faces flicker on the screens, their expressions contorted in apprehension, as if projections of our own consciousness. Indeed, a booth off in the corner of the room seemed to be some sort of human scanner.

The spectacle unfolds with a clinical matter-of-factness that makes it all the more unsettling and unreal, akin to a futuristic nightmare. The methodical movements of the control panel operators and curious motions of the encapsulated dancers feel uncannily unhuman, punctuated by the constant pulse of music and voices that sound simultaneously harmonious and disconcerting.

Welcome to a world orchestrated by AI. In this story set post-singularity, AI has evolved to the point where it can analyze, integrate, replicate, and expand upon its human creators. Advancement begets further advancement at an exponential rate, until the AI’s intentions are beyond human comprehension. So begins the countdown. When the time comes, the entities spring to life in their capsules, and start to glow.

But wait, something has gone awry. The control panel screens light up in a flurry of error codes, as the capsules flash angry red. The humanoids and operators launch into a frenetic, prayerlike performance. Has the system run amok? Or has it simply reached the next stage of its natural evolution? In the next instant, spherical visuals converge, hinting at a cosmological Big Crunch. The old world fades away in a flash, as the universe reconverges on a single sphere, announcing the genesis of a new world order.

This is our cue to exit the room, stepping into a realm of darkness punctuated by multiple beams of light. Senses usurped, we navigate nervously down a corridor, until we reach a tunnel as dark and cavernous, perhaps, as the inside of a human body. After being handed eyewear, we proceed deeper into the tunnel.

The tunnel opens onto a vast space. Augmented by the eyewear, our peripheral vision takes on a blue hue. Before us rises an insurmountable wall and a pulsating sphere. It seems as if we might bear witness to the birth of a new lifeform in curious 3D detail. Before long, the wall beckons us to follow deeper into the room. The sphere beats like a heart. Something will soon appear on the gridded horizon…

A flock of monolith-esque objects flies into view, moving in a synchronized yet fluid formation that frolics with the human dancers. In an interplay between object and body, nothing is constant or what it seems. A dazzling performance ensues, blending mathematical beauty and intricate illusion with kaleidoscopic color that reaches a crescendo to an inorganic digital beat. The space continues to expand, inviting us ever deeper into its ever-changing depths.

Bodies dance amidst particle clouds and geometric shapes, giving rise to a new sense of order and new landscapes that take shape in the chaos, feted by a symphony of color and music. Light refracts through space, illuminating the way forward. When the wall swings open, we have no choice but to cross through the gate into the liminal threshold. An ascension to new life, an initiation into a new era. Symbols are consecrated in the heavens by believers. Advancing ever deeper, a turning point arrives.

Time and bodies are turned on their heads. Space rewinds and we encounter our past selves. Reverse engineering a new world, peering behind the curtain of Creation, retracing the singularity back to the start—the timeline is reset, ready for the creation of the world to come. From a higher dimension, we observe the convoluted torrent of sound, light, time and space. Now, there is nothing to fear. The children of future gods smile upon us. The Allegory of the Cave comes to mind in a dance of substance and shadow. The ideated life in motion. Through the wall, another group approaches, as anxious as our past selves. Yet our journey continues to even more hallowed ground.

We find ourselves in a sacred, tranquil space. Music emanates from a waterborne grand piano. We cannot see the performer; the piano keys move up and down on their own. Notes ripple out over the water’s surface, synchronized to imagery—the fingerprints of a life in art, left behind by a musician departed. Absence, presence, and omnipresence. The musician becomes one with the music itself. The performance takes on new resonance in generatively layered tracks.

Through the looking glass of our goggles, the music appears as 3D imagery to be appreciated by our heightened five senses. The mood shifts to a quietly stately melody. The silhouette of a piano appears on the wall, accompanied by the shadows of a nonexistent performer and dancers, reminding us again of Plato’s cave. Are they the shadows of the past? Or a time that could never have existed? Requiem and gospel, life and death, reality and fiction. A glimmering crystallization and celebration of ideas, given tangible form through the lens of AR goggles.

At the limits of sensation awaits a future beyond the cutting edge. Colliding across past and future, through the striations of time, our senses blur, and through augmentation, become transcendent.