And, yes, it is an official SXSW XR event – but it’s free for everyone and waiting for you (and anybody else who’s got a smartphone), beginning on March 9.
“Eclipsing” – created in collaboration with astrophysicist Katie Breivik to explore the concepts of the relativity of simultaneity, deep time, eclipse cycles, and star formation – incorporates elements of binaural sound design, environmental recordings, narration and guidance along its riverside journey.
How it works: Audience members download an app using their smartphones, then set off on a walk from the Long Center at specific times and head to the Trail at Lady Bird Lake. Binaural sound design is activated by precise location and time of day, heard via your headphones or earbuds, featuring narration that was researched, created, and recorded in Austin guiding the way. Live interactions are hidden in plain sight along the approximately two-mile walk that lasts about an hour.
“A total eclipse is all about being in the right place at the right time – where the ‘heres’ and ‘nows’ line up,” explains Point A’s Andrew Schneider. “Sometimes an entire city is in the right place at the right time. And sometimes just one person is. This public artwork puts participants through the experience of both. The cosmos of the universe – and the inner cosmos of ourselves.”
Want to learn more? Here’s the FAQs for you.
Want to reserve your free ticket? You can do that RIGHT HERE, starting on Friday, Feb. 16, at 10am.
Note: To further celebrate the first total solar eclipse in Austin since 1397, the Simons Foundation – as part of its In the Path of Totality initiative (in partnership with Waterloo Greenway Conservancy, the Long Center, and Fusebox) – will host three days of eclipse-related programming on April 7-9. Thousands of Austinites will gather at Waterloo Greenway and the Long Center to commemorate the celestial event, which includes a free Total Eclipse Viewing Party at the Long Center on April 8.
This article appears in February 9 • 2024.