Regional_Express is an acoustic-visual immersive narrative on the rail route from Attnang-Puchheim to Tauplitz which deals with the cultural and natural heritage of the region. While traveling with the train, an immersive experience for a curated application (e.g. Pocket Guide) and for virtual reality (360/AR) will be created in the form of a journey through time and memory.
The narrative will be elaborated in a participatory manner with the population and communicated as a speculative history of the region to an international audience. Like memory itself, it will consist of fragments that are fed from facts and fiction and will allow new perspectives through its performative character. The stories will expand beyond personal ones and change the perspectives to nature as a narrator, the glaciers under the effects of climate change, the transformation of stone which take place in the contemporary human history. On the route, a variety of protagonists take up space in the train, new encounters take place and audio-visual landscapes expand the memory and imagination. The dramaturgy develops itself through the parameters of the train as a stage and limited space, the route as a chronological axis, the speed of travel and the stops as a form of timing for a sensory experience. The project will be developed in multiple medial steps that are always connected to each and which are communicated to the public. In order to begin, workshops will be used to search ideas and the results will be documented on a website. The narrative will be presented as an immersive experience for the European Capital of Culture year and prepared as virtual reality after that time for an international audience.
