Bardo Bear — AMANDA TASSE

Poetic Science

a spacial psychology well-being quest for VR and 360 projection.

Bardo Bear is a 3D immersive play experience that joins esoteric ritual and sacred world-building with contemplative art therapy activities to support kaleidoscopic well-being. A bardo is a liminal journey between worlds. Bear is a spirit guide that helps with navigation, gestures, and activities as needed.

Bardo Bear involves research and development into spatial user experience design for well-being. Navigation includes embedded cellular “marks” for storing and sharing reflections in “the grid”, and links to connect to the spaces where they occurred. It includes symbols to access new activities and whirls to jump to energetic spaces associated with color hues.

Spaces and their associated experiences and activities can be accessed spatially (or via the 2.5D grid and symbols). For example, a floating walkway leads to a whitish square of light. Upon reaching the square light, the visitor becomes immersed in a “light bath” space.

The “Light Bath” washes down as a channel of white and then golden light. This then transitions to reveal a simple room made out of rich, sparkling, golden architecture. Pillars of gold melt into a pool of honey. The viewer wades through the honey, pushing it gently as a bear in the distance joins in, delightedly.

Back in the main spatial interface, the viewer eyes the blue whirl and a watery bear and floating diamond appear.

This initiates the blue swirling experience.

A field of watery blobs coalesces into a circle around the central ripple whirl. Eventually, small flames appear within these and one of the orbs brings a light closer to the visitor, inviting them closer to join in at a missing space in the circle.

The flames then radiate out in all directions like tiny stars.

Eventually, they transition into fire-work like displays of swirling and chaotic passion. Then, as flowers that can be pulled near or pushed away and “popped”.

These are a sampling of some of the experiences and simple energetic spaces. Therapeutic art activities are reimagined as simple gestural interactions that highlight simulated ASMR haptics and audio. The gestures relate to environmental wisdom qualities such as pacifying reflective “water”, energizing “wind” fields, and enriching goldenness, informed by a contemplative arts program I have been facilitating for over 15 years, initially designed by a Tibetan Buddhist teacher, though Bardo Bear is playfully reimagined without specific religious context.

Immersing ourselves in spaces intentionally designed to enhance qualities of well-being can be a huge support, especially when we don’t have the time, energy, resources, or expertise to rearrange our physically built environment or access natural areas. Bardo Bear hopes that visitors find a space that resonates with them, and provides opportunities to share creative insights and reflections with other visitors, based on reflective prompts. It takes seriously the influence of “setting” in “set and setting” from therapeutic psychedelic research into guidelines for supportive journeys (“set” being our mindset and “setting” being our external or social “setting”).