'Fantasy City': Immersive digital experience explores modern life's spiritual side

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Are you watching light or something else? Why are we here, and is there life after death? An exhibition in Beijing called 'Fantasty City' might help you explore these questions. Inspired by the Tibentan Buddhist symbol, the mandala or TAN CHENG, it gets viewers to rethink or un-think the world we live in on a physical and spiritual level. Li Qiong takes us there!

Mandala patterns fill the exhibition hall with forms and materials. The five traditional elements the mandela portrays – earth, air, fire, water, and space - are all presented through different digital art pieces.

This one is called Reincarnation. It simulates the function of air. 260,000 particles on the screen can move with a person's motions.

YUAN SHUN VISITOR "This is so cool! It's like some somatic games, but more sensitive. It feels great to control thousands of spots on screen. Very interesting."

Visitors are invited to feel and help create the art works.

Not everyone shares the religious faith, but the exhibition is still believed to arouse people's inner thoughts, and rethink their spiritual status.

Passing through this 30-meter-long, rainbow-like aisle, visitors are exposed to an entirely different art hall, this one more modern and fresh.

Simulating different sounds in nature, or, letting nature simulate the sounds of modern life. All this, organisers say, is to emphasize the importance of the environment we live in.

ZHAO DONGBO CURATOR "In the first hall, the religious symbols of mandala can inspire awareness of their spiritual pursuit. While in the other, we display modern city elements to remind visitors of their living status, that they might never recognise. Both halls aim to stimulate people to think about the problems existing in their lives and what they want to pursue."

One of the biggest problems, some artists think, is that people nowadays rely so much on digital devices that they are becoming more and more indifferent.

On this metro, everyone is deeply immersed in their own digital world, even without knowing the explosive danger that is drawing near.

The 'Fantasy City' exhibition runs through March 24th, at Wangfu Central in Beijing. LQ, CGTN.