Faculty of Design

Graphic Design

Jon Owen

New Terrain

New Terrain is a piece exploring the absurdity of virtual space, a function right alongside its inevitability. If you're able to stay inside to help the spread of our global pandemic, it's likely you spend more time in virtual reality than in real reality. Reality is a space that's visited, virtual reality is where connection, work, socialization, recreation, and appreciation preside. Through a series of virtual space happenings, New Terrain offers meditations on our absurd context, soothing experiences, memories degraded by corrupted files, and a place to rest. A part of Age of Loss, New Terrains seeks to extend the concerns of that work, finding a place for grief in our world increasingly defined by loss, accepting the absurd, and learning to live with all our complex emotions.New Terrain is best explored at Age of Loss through the web link below.

“Using both VR capable and desktop friendly video, New Terrain offers spaces for viewers to meditate on virtual space. Each terrain presents a unique landscape and aural moment to place the user within finite spaces. The experience starts with a top down view of the limited space, a representation of the limited and constrained nature of our own virtual spaces. The viewer is then engulfed in the virtual world of each experience within each terrain.”