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Art / Work

Pafloodstan

A VR experience about climate migration in Pakistan

Pafloodstan
Year
2022–2023
Role
Direction, art direction and overall creation
With
Hania Inram, Pakistani climate action collective
Shown at
The World Around Summit, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (April 2023); Academic showcase, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá
Tools
Quill, Adobe Premiere, Adobe Audition
Links
Profile on The World Around

What it is

A virtual reality experience painted in Quill about the 2022 floods that covered a third of Pakistan and displaced millions of people. It is not a documentary: it is a place you inhabit, where the water rises and the scale of the body shifts against the scale of the disaster.

Process

The idea was born in Linz, during Ars Electronica’s Festival University, when I met a good friend, Hania Inram. I worked with Hania and her Pakistani climate action collective, YCA, to build the story from the people who lived through it. The space was painted in layers: first the gesture of the valley and the mountain in line, then the volume in patches of color and finally the figures and the water.

Where it has been shown

The World Around Summit at the Guggenheim Museum (New York, April 2023), as part of the Young Climate Prize cohort of 25, and in an academic showcase for students and faculty at the Javeriana.

Gallery

Project presentation — Young Climate Prize 2023 (The World Around)
Equirectangular panorama of the scene: on one side a dry ochre valley with an animal drawn in strokes, on the other a snowy mountain under a blue sky.
A cow drawn in loose strokes walks across ochre ground, against an earth-colored wall.
The same stroke-drawn cow in front of a white and blue wave coming into the ochre ground, with posts stuck in the water.
An orange canyon with two waterfalls dropping from high above onto a dark bed covered in green leaves.
Five human figures made of black line scribbles cross a bluish-gray ice plain.
A buffalo drawn in strokes stops before a blue and white wave breaking over dry land.
Project poster: over snowy mountains it reads «PAFLOODSTAN. Climate migrants VR project. David Andres Vega Monsalve», with two QR codes and figures of people walking with bundles.
Yellow sketch on a blue background: the profile of a mountain range drawn in a single gesture, with freehand notes.
Process, January 2023: first sketch of the valley.
White line drawing on dark blue: a snowy mountain rendered only with its outline and the ravines running down it.
Process, January 2023: the mountain in line.
White line drawing on dark blue: the mountain range seen from the floor of a valley, between two slopes opening up in the foreground.
Process, January 2023: the line opened up to 360 degrees.
Digital painting of a snowy mountain in flat patches of blue, gray and white, against a deep blue sky.
Process, January 2023: first volume in color.
Snowy mountain range painted in flat patches: two white and blue peaks under a dark blue sky, with the gray slope in the foreground.
Process, January 2023: the full landscape in color.
Scene from the work: five figures made of black scribbles cross an ice plain while, in the background, blue water floods ochre ground.
Process, January 2023: the crossing, now with the figures.
Scene from the work: a buffalo in yellow and ochre strokes moves away from a blue and white wave breaking over dry land, with a bent tree on the left.
Process, January 2023: the animal facing the flood.