LAHORE: The first edition of the VXR Festival, Pakistan’s virtual and extended reality festival, opened to a full house at Alliance Française de Lahore on Sunday, bringing together artists, creative practitioners and audiences to explore the evolving intersections of art, technology and immersive experiences.
Titled ‘Between the Prompts / V.1’, the festival is presented with the support of the Embassy of France in Pakistan, Alliance Française de Lahore, the Institut français, the Embassy of Spain in Pakistan and AECID, in collaboration with UNESCO.
Curated by Dr Najamul Assar and Sarah Rajper, with Zainab Aamir as the assistant curator,the festival brought together the work of 70 artists from Pakistan, Spain, France, Canada, the United States and other countries, with exhibitions and activities taking place across Lahore and Islamabad. Sixteen artists were featured at the opening, including Adriaan Lokman, Amna Tariq, Anusha Khalid, Asma Kazmi, Che-Kuang Chuang, Jérémy Griffaud, Jill Miller, Lola Zoido, Manel Pascual Bafaluy, Mansoor Ali, Marie Lienhard, Marion Pédebernade (Waii-Waii), Nicolas Thépot, Pierre-Alain Pédebernade, Sana Akram and Sandrine Deumier.
Between the Prompts explored the space between instruction and image, examining how artists engage with, reinterpret and challenge the technologies and algorithms increasingly shaping the creation of visual content.Throughout the afternoon, visitors experienced a range of immersive artworks through headsets and screens, followed by a meet the artists session featuring AB Rehman, Anusha Khalid, Lola Zoido, Mansoor Ali, Marie Lienhard and Sandrine Deumier.
Co-curator Sarah Rajper said, ‘For most people who walked in today, this was the first time they had put on a headset to experience art, not a game or a demo. Watching that moment happen again and again, people going quiet and then turning to whoever was next to them to talk about what they’d seen, made the months of work worth it.
Festival founder and co-curator Dr Najam said, ‘We wanted to bring this work to Pakistan on its own terms, and the response tells us audiences here havebeen ready for it.
The immersive experience also left a lasting impression on visitors. One attendee shared: ‘I expected technology, but what stayed with me was how personal it felt. Standing inside someone’s memory of a Karachi home, I forgot I was wearing anything at all.
Following its opening in Lahore, the VXR Festival will continue at R Space today at the Mariam Dawood School of Visual Arts and Design, and Beaconhouse National University on Nov 12. The festival will then travel to Islamabad, where its programme will run from Nov 13 to 15.
VXR Festival is an initiative of the Lahore Digital Arts Festival team, which has been supporting digital art and creative technology in Pakistan since 2019.