Introducing the Doppelgänger
An investigation into the potentials, promises, specificities and limitations of digital technologies in design.
Photo: Nick Clayton, Adelaide
In 2020 the University of South Australia, the SIDA Foundation, and The David Roche Foundation awarded a two-year Research Fellowship in Interior Design and Decoration to the project The Doppelgänger.
The Doppelgänger is an investigation into the potentials and promises, as well as the limitations and specificities, of digital technologies in design.
The project has been developed by the Melbourne School of Design’s Associate Professor of Architecture and Design Rochus Hinkel. The first outcomes, a virtual tour, a series of AR objects, and a series of visual animation installations, developed together with NExT Lab coordinator Melissa Iraheta, are currently exhibiting in Adelaide until December 16.
The David Roche Foundation’s Fermoy House and its collection of decorative arts served as the site of investigation for this project. The house and parts of its collection have been documented through video recordings, 360º photography, and 3D scans – creating digital copies of the Foundation’s collection and spaces.
The Doppelgänger exhibition presents digital copies of four selected items in the collection. By experimenting with alterations of original artefacts ‘uncanny’ new characters emerge offering novel perspectives, creating alternative realities, and enabling an exploration of new forms of representation.
To experience The Doppelgänger, head to the exhibition section of The David Roche Foundation website. Showing from November 10 – December 16.
Fragment of the video: Fabulations – Incubus and Sylph, 2021 from a'finiti on Vimeo.
Video animation, 3D scan, 3-million-point cloud, 3840 x 2160 pixel. After The music lesson, c.1760, Chelsea Porcelain Factory London, Britain c.1744–69, porcelain (soft-paste), David Roche Foundation collection number 765; after The enjoyable lesson (L’Agréable Leçon), 1748, François Boucher (France, 1703-1770), 1748, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, accession number E1-1982.