David Koh

“Totem” is an AR monument, a re-imagining of public sculptural art when including augmented reality capabilities. Inspired by the aesthetics of many urban artworks such as Cloud Gate (Anish Kapoor, Chicago), I wanted the metallic look of “Totem” to feel familiar and at home in a modern city environment. When making it, I wanted to ask, “what could a public art sculpture look and behave like if it had the unreal qualities of AR?”, “how would I invite the public to interact with the sculpture?”. “Totem” consists of 7 individual stacked prisms that float and tilt at an unreal angle. When each prism is tapped, they rotate, with each ascending prism rotating faster than the previous one. With “Totem”, I wanted to imagine future possibilities where cities seamlessly incorporate AR public artworks with the real world, a time when a digital sculpture may sit next to a real world sculpture and becomes a natural part of the environment.