New immersive experiences at Wales Millennium Centre announced for 2024

Wales Millennium Centre has unveiled it’s first set of immersive experiences for its 20th year, alongside a new innovative partnership to encourage under-represented communities to explore opportunities within a growing artform.

Bocs, WMC’s dedicated venue for immersive arts – including XR (virtual reality, mixed reality and augmented reality), 360 films, projections and other interactive media – will host a range of free experiences throughout 2024 that aim to engage and inspire through new forms of storytelling. Through April, a world of immersive experiences will be available through StoryFutures’ XPERIENCE, over a dozen experiences covering diverse themes including music, sport and climate change and range from beautifully animated 360 films to full interactive immersive experiences. In May, the UK premiere of interactive and narrative VR experience Empereur invites the user to travel inside the brain of a father suffering from aphasia, a language disorder that leaves someone unable to communicate effectively with others. Empereur won the Venice Immersive Achievement Prize at the 80th Venice Film Festival in 2023.

During the summer, Invisible Ocean will bring together a series of shared interactive experiences to take you beneath the surfaces of the ocean. One of them, the social VR experience Drop in the Ocean, takes you down to the marine depths of the Midnight Zone – and directly into the plastic pollution crisis plaguing the world’s oceans – while another, Critical Distance, uses mixed reality (MR) to bring audiences into the world of Southern Resident orcas in North America. Throughout Wales Millennium Centre, you’ll be able to embark on a digital scavenger hunt with Interactive Oceans and use mobile devices to reveal some of the world’s most remarkable marine creatures.

Further immersive experiences in 2024, including as part of the Centre’s annual Llais international arts festival, will be announced in due course.

David Massey, Senior Digital Experiences Producer at Wales Millennium Centre, said: “Wales Millennium Centre is quickly becoming recognised as a centre for XR excellence by audiences, producers and distributors around the world and Bocs is seen as a real destination to premiere new and inspiring work.

“As interest continues to grow in this new form of storytelling – arguably the first new artform since cinema – we’re aiming to widen access to this kind of work through our rolling programme of experiences, events and workshops. There’s never been a better time to try something new!”

Wales Millennium Centre’s new partnership with the Ida Network will establish Ida Hwb, a community for women, non-binary and trans people within the immersive XR sector to be celebrated and welcomed. WMC will host a first in-person meetup in May 2024, and continue to act as a focal point to share information for a growing community with the aim of encouraging new connections, collaborations and ventures.

This announcement comes hot on the heels of the unveiling of Immersive Arts, a £6 million project unlocking the creative potential of new technology in which Wales Millennium Centre is a producing partner.

StoryFutures: XPERIENCE
A world of immersive experiences

1 – 21 April 2024
https://www.wmc.org.uk/en/whats-on/2024/storyfutures-xperience

Age guidance varies by experience

Emperur

1 – 19 May 2024
https://www.wmc.org.uk/en/whats-on/2024/empereur

Age guidance: 13+

Invisible Ocean

27 July – 8 September 2024
https://www.wmc.org.uk/en/whats-on/2024/the-invisible-ocean

Age guidance: 13+