Way to Be — Vernon Ah Kee
Cairns Tropical and Innovation Festival, 2024
About the project
Led by artist Vernon Ah Kee, Way to Be combined art, technology and cultural storytelling to bring a remote Western Yalanji heritage site to a broad public audience. Through immersive displays, the project created a layered interpretation of Country and demonstrated how sensitive places can be shared beyond their physical boundaries.
The challenge
The project needed to transform complex scientific, cultural and technical datasets into an engaging interpretive experience. It brought together technologists, archaeologists and cultural specialists, connected a virtual space to a real-world location, and ensured the final display was accessible to people of different ages, languages and levels of digital literacy.
The solution
IM integrated art thinking, technology, exhibition design and cultural storytelling to create a multi-layered experience. Working with local rangers, drone filmmakers, editors, audio engineers and technologists, the team combined 4K aerial and ground footage, high-fidelity field recordings and point-cloud 3D scans. Artist-led spatial design guided how each layer was revealed, encouraging conversation, learning and a deeper sense of place.
The results
The project culminated in a free public exhibition in Cairns that offered several ways to connect with Western Yalanji Country. A looping film captured the landscape across day and night, an immersive soundscape enveloped the space, and an interactive point-cloud model revealed the scale of the rock-wall art. The exhibition demonstrated how digital storytelling can support access to and preservation of sensitive heritage sites while enabling audiences to experience a place they cannot physically visit.
Project services: engagement, communication, art-projects
