This video opens with a live walk-through of Jakob Kudsk Steensen’s 2017 VR artwork, Aqua phobia: Fear of Water, which takes us on an immersive journey through watery landscapes, from past subterranean mud tunnels to a bridge extending over future rising waters. The VR environment features echoes of Valentino Jr. Park and Pier in Redhook, Brooklyn—places underwater during hurricane Sandy—alongside landscapes from different eras, where roots, plants, and futuristic architectural elements symbiotically intertwine with one another.

Jakob Kudsk Steensen then discusses his work with curator Daniel Birnbaum (director and curator, Acute Art). Their conversation, moderated by Cristina Baldacci (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice) and Valeria Facchin (Producer and independent curator, London), ranges over the possibilities for virtual reality and hybrid formats for artworks and life in the contemporary socio-ecological context; the unique power of VR in rendering an immersive experience of unfamiliar environments, scales, and realities; the research and development process behind Jakob’s artworks; and questions of agency, emotions, psychology, and energy-use with regard to VR.

Aquaphobia: Fear of Water was specially conceived for the Anthropocene Campus Venice, in collaboration with Steensen, with the support of the Danish Arts Foundation.