LAYERS OF PLACE: MIT Symposium. Augmented Reality as Art, Voice and Resistance
April 7, 2025
In conjunction with the MIT Open Documentary Lab’s AR and Public Space Artist Collective’s exhibition, Layers of Place: MIT, this interdisciplinary panel explores how artists and communities are using augmented reality to reveal the layers of histories, stories, and perspectives of place. How does AR make the invisible visible? How can artists and communities present counter-narratives, and bring the past into dialogue with the present to imagine new futures? What unfolds when digital commentary overlays physical space and how does co-creation shift power in that process?
From the perspective of a curator, technologist, community leader, artist, and scholar, we will hear how artists and communities co-create with AR as an artistic medium and a tool of resistance to reclaim narratives of place. How can AR be used to find commonalities between communities, to bridge divides, and to see multiple perspectives? How can site-specific work move beyond? What are the limitations of an invisible medium like AR — and how might its discreet nature also open new pathways for resistance and storytelling?
Panelists:
- Leonie Bradbury, Distinguished Curator-in-Residence, Emerson College, moderator
- Gediminas Urbonas, Associate Professor, Art, Culture, and Technology, MIT
- Lori Landay, Artist, Layers of Place: MIT – Moving Memory
- Meghna Singh, Artist, Layers of Place: MIT – The Fovnders Pillars
- Michael Dawson, Co-founder and CEO, Innovators for Purpose
- Nicolas Robbe, CEO, Hoverlay