Call for participation
CIRMMT students are invited to participate in Drosera Obscura, an interdisciplinary workshop and research collaboration between Virginia Tech and McGill University.
Drosera Obscura combines live performance, robots and animatronics, extended reality (XR), spatial sound, music, projection, scent, touch, and responsive technologies to create an immersive performance environment.
We are casting a wide net and welcome students from many different backgrounds and disciplines. You do not need to have experience with every aspect of the project.
We are especially interested in students working in:
- Vocal performance
- Dance and movement
- Music and composition
- Sound design and spatial audio
- Creative coding and programming
- Robotics and animatronics
- Electronics and physical computing
- XR, VR, and interactive media
- Game engines and real-time environments
- Sensors and interactive systems
- Performance and theater
- Visual art and design
CIRMMT students will have the opportunity to collaborate with artists, researchers, faculty, and students from Virginia Tech in the continued development of Drosera Obscura.
The collaboration will culminate in workshops and research presentations at CIRMMT from December 1st to 3rd, 2026 in the Multimedia Room (MMR).
We are interested in students who want to experiment, collaborate across disciplines, and explore new relationships between humans, machines, sound, movement, and immersive technologies.
Additional information about Drosera Obscura is available in this press kit.
Interested?
To register please complete this MS form including a short introduction describing your area of interest, skills, and how you might like to participate: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/r/suaBHuiRM8
Deadline to express interest in the collaboration: Thursday November 26, 2026, 4:00pm EST.
Additional questions regarding the project may be addressed to the CIRMMT/Virginia Tech project team: Thomasjt[AT]vt[DOT]edu (Virginia Tech).
Preliminary schedule (all days)
9:00–10:00: setup
10:00–12:00: workshop
13:00–16:00: workshop/rehearsal
16:00–17:00: public presentation + 30-minute discussion