Extended reality takes visitors from the ruins of West Bank to 17th-century Amsterdam at Venice Immersive

From frivolous to serious, virtual nosy passersby to the impact of climate change, the groundbreaking festival draws to a close – but this year the exhibits live on The first installation one encounters on visiting Venice Immersive, the film festival’s reliably head-spinning showcase for new media, is a chest-high metal box fitted with an eyepiece and two speakers.

On peering inside you see a view of yourself from about 20ft above. You see the other guests walking past, a couple of pigeons on the ground. When one of these passersby lingers at your side for just a moment too long, the obvious impulse is to glance up from the eyepiece in order to see what they want. It is at this point that the experience blooms into a Lynchian nightmare. The passerby is not real – or rather, he’s only real in the box. He wears a…