Skip to content
1981
Volume 12, Issue 1
  • ISSN: 2051-7041
  • E-ISSN: 2051-705X

Abstract

This article explores Huang Hsin-Chien’s virtual reality (VR) film (2021) and its investigation of a speculative futurity and alternative configuration of the human body in virtual worlds. The film is conceived as a journey inspired by Buddhist philosophy and science fiction. In this article, themes of futurity, speculation, mutation and becoming are then addressed in relation to theorists such as David Lapoujade, Steven Shaviro, Rosi Braidotti and Elizabeth Grosz. These themes are contrasted with a spiritual understanding of reincarnation and rebirth in Buddhism to better understand the film’s aesthetic and illustrate how speculation and spirituality both influence its narrative and its visuals. The article contends that creates a rethinking and re-envisioning of the relationship between speculation and reincarnation through a reconfiguration of corporeality in VR. The article addresses the following questions: How does Huang’s use of VR technology contribute to the development of a speculative aesthetic that imagines alternative human and non-human configurations and how is it connected to its exploration of reincarnation and rebirth?

Funding
This study was supported by the:
  • SSHRC post-doctoral fellowship (Award 756-2023-0011)
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1386/jcca_00117_1
2025-07-22
2026-04-16

Metrics

Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Boehme, Armand J. (2018), ‘The final spiritual frontier? The spirituality of science fiction’, European Journal of Science and Theology, 14:5, pp. 1524.
    [Google Scholar]
  2. Braidotti, Rosi (2002), Metamorphoses: Towards a Materialist Theory of Becoming, London: Polity Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  3. Chalmers, David (2022), Reality +: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy, New York: WW Norton.
    [Google Scholar]
  4. Grosz, Elizabeth (2004), Time Travels: Feminism, Nature, Power, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  5. Grosz, Elizabeth (2011), Becoming Undone: Darwinian Reflections on Life, Politics, and Art, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Huang, Hsin-Chien (2021), Samsara, Taiwan: VPAT.
    [Google Scholar]
  7. Huang, Hsin-Chien (2022), ‘Samsara behind the scene’, YouTube, 30 September 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDIudBwhOvA&t=244s, Accessed 6 March 2025.
  8. Keown, Daniel (2013), A Dictionary of Buddhism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  9. Lanier, Jaron (2017), Dawn of the New Everything: Encounters with Reality and Virtual Reality, New York: Henry Holt & Co.
    [Google Scholar]
  10. Lapoujade, David (2024), Worlds Built to Fall Apart: Versions of Philip K. Dick, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  11. Lauro-Lazin, Linda (2022), Hsin-Chien Huang: The Data We Called Home, exhibition catalogue, Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York.
    [Google Scholar]
  12. Monnet, Livia (2022), ‘Like a dream, an illusion, a drop of dew, a flash of lighting: Buddhist (un)reality, thought experiments, and the “ecological dharma eye” in Lu Yang’s “material world knight game film”’, Screen Bodies, 7:1, pp. 4478, https://doi.org/10.3167/screen.2022.070104.
    [Google Scholar]
  13. Remy-Handfield, Gabriel (2024), ‘Towards a techno-hauntological aesthetic: Immiscible time and the spiritual imagination in bodyless (shishenji) by Huang Hsin-Chien’, Journal of Chinese Film Studies, 4:3, pp. 52743, https://doi.org/10.1515/jcfs-2024-0003.
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Shaviro, Steven (2024), Fluid Futures: Science Fiction and Potentiality, London: Repeater.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Spampinato, Maria F. and Carticalà, Valentino (2021), ‘Contemporary art and virtual reality: New conditions of viewership’, Cinergie – Il cinema e le altre arti, 10:19, pp. 12133, https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2280-9481/12322.
    [Google Scholar]
  16. Tornatzky, Cyane and Kelley, Brendan (2023), An Artistic Approach to Virtual Reality, New York and London: Routledge.
    [Google Scholar]
  17. Vint, Sherryl (2021), Science-Fiction, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  18. The Wachowskis (1999), The Matrix, USA: Warner Bros.
    [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1386/jcca_00117_1
Loading
/content/journals/10.1386/jcca_00117_1
Loading

Data & Media loading...

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a success
Invalid data
An error occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error
Please enter a valid_number test