Robin
Champenois

TERAVERSTASIS

"It was one viral image too many. The one that made us all sick.”
Teraverstasis is a nostalgic exploration of the ruins of a lost metaverse, a cyberspace decimated by a strange virus. It is a journey through the digital space and the intimate memories of an AI; in places inhabited both by sweet memories and by the disturbing remains of missing inhabitants. It is presented both as a video game letting the spectator discover it; and as a short movie recalling its history in a poetic way.
The artwork itself was created using various artificial intelligence algorithms, to (co)edit the textures, the texts, and the main character’s inner voices. At a time when billions are spent to develop the “Metaverse”, it tells a story of its future collapse. Through the use of fictional dialogues and enigmatic poems, Teraverstasis aims at making us empathize with those non-human beings. It also questions our legacy, and explores how the machine’s irrationality strangely resembles ours.