PXR2026 Awake and Still Drowning

The PXR2026 Conference is excited to announce "Awake and Still Drowning" as part of our Experience Stream!

AWAKE & STILL DROWNING is a hands-on, mixed-reality performance about climate change, place, and collective movement. Audience members become part of a flock of seabirds attempting to cross the rapidly flooding Chignecto Isthmus—the narrow land bridge connecting Nova Scotia to mainland Canada.

Guided by quiet narration, hand-drawn text, and a bird companion, participants move together through a shifting landscape as the water rises around them. The experience is physical and shared: you walk, pause, adjust, and respond in real time as you navigate the space alongside others. 

By turning viewers into participants, AWAKE & STILL DROWNING invites audiences to feel the urgency of environmental change not as a distant issue, but as something lived, collective, and unfolding in the present. The work received the Best Immersive Experience Award at the 2025 Guanajuato International Film Festival (GIFF) in Mexico.

Production by XO SECRET