Second Places

Liberate Your Avatar

From the Let's Go Global website:

An interactive public video art installation incorporating Second Life users in a real life environment.

This completely unique project brings together fifteen years of telepresence research by artist and Professor of Creative Technology at Salford University, Paul Sermon, with his current experiments and experiences in the online three-dimensional world of Second Life.

In this new project, Paul Sermon will recreate the actual All Saints Gardens on Oxford Road within Second Life, allowing both members of the public and virtual inhabitants ('avatars') of Second Life to coexist and share the same park bench in a live interactive installation.

This installation will transform the 'Urban Screen' situated in All Saints Gardens into a portal between these two parallel worlds. The installation will also investigate demonstration and how it has changed from real into virtual environments. By positioning the 'Urban Screen' as the mediator of change, the installation will examine the history of 'All Saints Gardens'; relocating Mancunian Suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst as an avatar within Second Life. Here she will she remain locked to the railings of the park, reminding us of the need to continually evaluate our role in this new online digital society. 'Liberate Your Avatar' examines this new crisis whilst drawing upon the history of the site, creating a rich, provoking and entirely innovative, interactive experience.

Second Places took part in the event, contributing the streaming service to both the real life venue and the audience in SL Manchester. The SL Manchester Events Arena played host to the virtual screening of the event.

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