Empowering communities through collaborative experimentation with new technologies
Typically in a workshop, participants are given a set method to learn from one person or a select few. In Inter(mediate) Spaces, the living lab format redistributes power to stakeholders who are deemed capable of contributing valued knowledge, and who co-create and participate in an exchange of knowledge. The project takes the stance that this approach can and should extend to the process of designing their shared physical spaces, where communities can imagine and realize the shared spaces that would better serve them as stakeholders.
What are living labs?
The concept of a Living Laboratory was first explored by MIT researchers, William Mitchell, Kent Larson and Alex Pentland. They argued that living lab represents a user-centric research methodology for sensing, validating and refining complex solutions in multiple and evolving real-life contexts.
What should I expect?
IMS “Reflections: A Digital Memory Living Lab” series invites people from each community to partake in this free five hour one day event to collectively reflect on placemaking, memories, and collaborate through guided writing exercises, AI generations, interviews and walks to enrich the future of each community.
The lab does not require prior technical expertise and is open to everyone. All necessary technology and tools will be provided.
The materials produced by participants in this lab series shall include personal images, videos, audio and writings. By the end of the day, curated works will be installed in an online 3D gallery and the materials become the basis for the long-term VR installation.
You can vist our 3D gallery from the last event we held in NYC here.
Breakdown of the day
In the first half of the lab, participants are guided through a written reflection on memories they have of their communities, and how they imagine their shared spaces to be like in the future. They are encouraged to write about their relationship with technology and to write sensorially; what is felt, heard, and seen. They are also asked to reimagine memories from new perspectives, embodying entities that may typically go unnoticed, like a runaway crab walking the sidewalks of Chinatown. These activities empower people to exercise their imaginations, which is an integral part of shaping their future spaces.
The second half is an open technology lab where, in pairs, participants share their written responses while using audio recorders to document their conversations. These audio recordings are then used in the VR experience as soundscapes, providing context to the audiovisual worlds that they generate with the provided AI tools. The responses to the writing sessions are used as text input to generate new 360 degree audiovisual landscapes.
Past and Future Labs
The labs are held in three different places, and New York City’s Chinatown was one that naturally came to mind first. It was a neighborhood that felt like home when I lived in New York. I held the first successful lab there on August 3rd, 2024, after a pilot lab that was held in Berlin on May 11, 2024.
The next lab will be held at a community center that my grandfather runs for the Lee Association in Montreal. This organization, whose members share the same last name, is struggling to find ways to engage the younger generation. With this lab series, I hope to bring an intergenerational group together.
