We discuss our experience at the Ryerson conference on 'VR as Empathy Machine' and take up our ambivalence about the medium. We offer several lukewarm cultural critical takes on contemporary digital media and the supposed connection to the real it affords, riff on Baudrillard, frontline work, kvetch about budget cuts, and do a playthrough of our VR documentary ‘resourced’ with a sickly and solemn 9 yr-old.

ARTIST STUDIO SPACE FOR RENT AT THE BRANDSCAPE : http://brandscape.club
RENDEZVOUS WITH MADNESS FESTIVAL : https://workmanarts.com/rendezvous-with-madness/

Simulations Jean Baudrillard Semiotext(e):
https://www.e-reading.club/bookreader.php/144970/Baudrillard_-_Simulacra_and_Simulation.pdf

VR as Empathy Machine: https://www.ryerson.ca/jack-layton-chair/events/2019/09/vr-as-empathy-machine/

Alan Warburton ‘Goodbye Uncanny Valley’: https://vimeo.com/237568588

Occupied : http://occupiedvr.com/

Ken Moffat Jack Layton Chair: https://www.ryerson.ca/socialwork/people/faculty/ken-moffatt/

Adam Curtis ‘The Trap’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y97Ywl7RtUw&vl=en etc

OYA MEDIA GROUP https://oyamediagroup.com/

Mayworks Toronto: https://www.nghtshfts.org/

Carol Conde & Karl Beveridge: http://condebeveridge.ca/