On Earth Day, exploring the potential of virtual reality films for protecting the environment

Atlantic Fellow,?Myriam Alejandra Hernández Vázquez, has co-created a ten-minute virtual reality film GAWI. When watched on a headset, the film is an immersive experience aimed at persuading audiences of the need to look after the environment. The VR film was made by her team and Rarámuri Indigenous communities from Northern Mexico, who live in breathtaking scenery, the high sierras and canyons in the Sierra Madre Occidental, and have been careful guardians of their environment and culture for hundreds of years.

Myriam said: “The film embraces the Rarámuri culture. They build their reality and wisdom by connecting with their dreams. At a time of climate crisis, the Rarámuri invite us to join them through a dream-like VR experience and you enter an intimate journey that unfolds at the pace of an ancestral poem about how to become a real Rarámuri, and heal the planet (GAWI) and yourself. It places Indigenous ecological wisdom at the center of the climate emergency conversation.”?

GAWI is also a research-action project powered by the?Atlantic Fellows for Social & Economic Equity (AFSEE)?program, based at The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), and the?Atlantic Institute, at Oxford, in the U.K. Myriam will be showing the VR film at a flagship event, the Global Atlantic Fellows Annual Convening in July, as part of the opening of a new XR (Extended Reality) Space at Rhodes House, Oxford.

Myriam said: “Due to these two prestigious institutions endorsing my work, I had a chance to produce a VR film in which the creative process is more important than the outcome. These partnerships reflect how Global North-based institutions are starting to engage with power-shifting dynamics. GAWI is, therefore, also a product of trust-based funding, which I would otherwise struggle to find as I am neither a renowned filmmaker nor a?VR producer.?

Myriam and the co-creators of GAWI want to use the immersive qualities of the film to touch different audiences: the tourists, so they learn how to respect the landscape and the Indigenous people living there; other Indigenous communities, so they see how VR can be a powerful advocacy tool; decision-makers who are shaping the climate justice agenda; and other activists, to show them that VR lends power to storytelling so such films help persuade audiences to adopt new narratives; the immersive nature can change hearts and minds more readily.

“Ultimately, the stories we live through VR/AR can elevate new narratives, solutions and invitations for change. In GAWI’s case, embracing a horizontal structure from the get-go led us to discover a powerful, wise narrative on the role played by Indigenous people in guarding and keeping the Earth alive and thriving.?Not surprisingly, the Experiencias Rarámuri group was ready to take on a project like this. They embraced the production team and the VR technology as comrades supporting the messages they have been upholding for decades about land dispossession, economic inclusion and respect for the biodiversity of their land. VR is just an innovative complement for their resistance, so they are recognized and supported. It needs to serve their struggle, not the other way around, as commonly happens.

“We need to open up this powerful space to diversify and amplify voices and identities so that their stories and lived experiences are not captured in the virtual world and reproduced endlessly for the benefit and sensibilization of those few who have access to VR headsets. Instead of reducing them to objects of the stories, I aim to produce VR content in which diverse bodies and identities are active creators shaping the medium, and even making it a space of their own.”