AL: Your record-breaking piece “Mars House” is featured in our Visions from Remembered Futures show at the SuperRare gallery. What inspired you to make this piece?
KK: I created Mars House during the height of the COVID lockdowns from February to May of 2020. While under quarantine with my two kids in my condo in Toronto, I began to daydream about my dream home to visit in VR. I decided to design and build it after researching the Samsung wall, which launched that year. I wanted to create a house, where the ceiling and floor are a uniform LED screen substrate, displaying my meditative artwork, as a complete, meditative experience.
I have been creating VR meditative immersive experiences since 2018, so I wanted to visit and experience the home in VR. I chose to build on Unreal Engine.
AL: What role do you see digital architecture playing in our future?
KK: Architecture will never be the same. The Mars House brought the world’s attention to NFT real estate, architecture and the Metaverse. I love design, and with the global pandemic, I designed anti-microbial furniture in glass. I wanted the furniture to be sustainable.
We are still early, but very soon, our hardware will be so advanced, that the fidelity of digital architecture will become indistinguishable from reality. Meaning, that Virtual Reality will become hyper real, and Augumented Reality will enhance architecture with a digital layer of interactive experience.
Creating a new architectural project in real life will be experienced on-site in AR; transforming the decision making and creative process of development planning. We will purchase the digital twin NFT of our physical homes. Digital Twin NFTs will serve as a deed of ownership in the future.
KK: I don’t agree with the current land grab of Metaverse platforms. I think it’s a bubble. I believe the future will be driven by experience economies; where communities will be activated through meaningful, immersive, ticketed experiences in beautiful spaces that are surreal and imaginative. I think it is silly to recreate shopping malls in the Metaverse. People want to be inspired in the Metaverse, and only art can deliver that outcome.
