The Cultural Spiral: Virtual Spaces as Records of Time

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore the possibilities of VRML technologies as foundational tools in the exploration of real and virtual cultural times and places. VRML allows for the 3D presentation of objects in space and of space as defined by objects. Starting from a specific cultural focus, such as a public work of art, VRML enables the perception of pathways to the focus. Situating the object then allows for the situating environment to be included, within the circularity of a VRML movie. By adding hot spots to the VRML, the viewer is then able to break out of the fixed circularity of the panovision, into the enlarged world. Within this enlarged world, information is able to retain its connectedness with the fundamental experience of the object in its environment. Information is also allowed to claim its own particular shape. That is, through varieties of documentation, including detailed views, historical documents etc. the viewer is able to encounter a variety of cultural foci. VRML can enable new kinds of texts and inter-texts. Current work, on a VRML project, using Throsby Creek, Newcastle as the site, illustrates the advantages of VRML as a foundational technology in opening up new kinds of understanding about the ways that we "read" and "write" the world.