Virtual Reality · 2020–2025

Simple Songs About Death

A narrative VR experience about memory, loss and transience

Category
Museums & New Media
Years
2020–2025
Premiere
DOX Centre for Contemporary Art, Prague — Art VR festival
Screenings
64th Kraków Film Festival, Still Human (Seoul), Ground Control, Galeria XXI
Technology
VR, Unreal Engine 4.27, real-time
Our role
Direction, script, spatial design, VR development

A journey through a sequence of dreamlike spaces, where movement, sound and light guide the viewer as in a stage play — a VR experience about memory, loss and transience.

“Simple Songs About Death” is our own project: from the script and poems, through direction and spatial design, to the VR build in Unreal Engine. It premiered at the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art in Prague during the Art VR festival.

It was later shown at the 64th Kraków Film Festival, the Still Human exhibition in Seoul, and exhibitions in Poland and abroad.

Dreamlike virtual environments from the VR experience — Unreal Engine 4.27
3D body scan — a virtual meditation on passing away
A virtual meditation on the fading of personality and body

Orpheus and Eurydice

Inspired by the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, the experience leads the user through a sequence of connected spaces. Movement, sound and environmental storytelling tell the story without a single word of exposition — the viewer walks the path themselves, a path on which you cannot look back.

A sequence of spaces

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Simple Songs About Death — level design Simple Songs About Death — a sequence of spaces Simple Songs About Death — immersive environment Simple Songs About Death — the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice Simple Songs About Death — real-time Simple Songs About Death — environmental storytelling

Level design — space designed like a stage set, with the viewer’s movement in mind.

Panoramas

Scroll to spread them out

Simple Songs About Death — panorama 1
Simple Songs About Death — panorama 2
Simple Songs About Death — panorama 3
Simple Songs About Death — panorama 4

Festivals and exhibitions

Since its premiere in Prague, “Simple Songs About Death” has travelled to festivals and exhibitions in Poland, the Czech Republic and South Korea. It was made as an immersive narrative experience that brings together direction, narrative design and the VR build — virtual environments, the sequencing of spaces and interactive elements in one coherent form.

Credits

Direction
Maciej Czuchryta, Marta Wieczorek
VR Development
Patrycja Superczyńska, Maciej Czuchryta, Kacper Bartnik
Script / poems
Maciej Czuchryta
Cast
Agnieszka Kijewska, Małgorzata Bela

The full production list is available on request.