Augmented Reality and Theatre

Abstract:

The technology industry’s recent spatial turn presents new opportunities for theatre and performance in the twenty-first century. One such opportunity is augmented reality (AR), a technology that overlays digitally rendered assets onto the user’s physical space, giving the appearance that those assets populate the physical world. Through an analysis of The Builders Association’s Elements of Oz, which incorporated mobile AR into its stage production, as well as Bitter Wind, the author’s adaptation of Agamemnon for the Microsoft HoloLens headset, this essay analyzes the interpretive possibilities AR creates for theatre and performance.