iquitos bird — immersive VR music video & inclusive exhibition
Iquitos Bird explores how music can be experienced beyond hearing. The project combines an immersive 360° VR music video with an interactive exhibition, inviting both hearing and hearing-impaired audiences to perceive music visually, spatially, and emotionally.
At its core, the project asks a simple question: How do people with hearing loss experience music? — and how can immersive media make that experience visible?
This is a 360° video. For the best experience switch to the YouTube App and there to full resolution.360° music video
We translated the song Iquitos Bird by Tom Simonetti (mycrotom) into a 360° immersive music video.
The video can be experienced in VR headsets, on YouTube in 360°, and in planetariums. Illustrations come to life in a spherical environment, allowing viewers to see music as movement, rhythm, and space rather than just sound.
From early on, the project was designed with planetariums in mind — reflected in abstract celestial scenes where constellations such as the Swan or the Big Dipper subtly appear.
inclusive exhibition
The Museum Höchstädt invited us to integrate Iquitos Bird into the exhibition Alles inklusive, which presented a range of inclusive projects.
We developed an interactive exhibition space centered around the VR music video. Two VR headsets showed the same visual experience — but with different audio tracks:
one with the original music
one with a heavily dampened sound, reflecting how many hearing-impaired people described their perception of music
Visitors were invited to vote on which version felt more intense.
The result was strikingly balanced. One visitor told us that the version with the dampened sound felt more immersive to her — a moment that perfectly reflected the core idea of the project.
the exhibition space
The entire room was designed as an immersive environment. All four walls were covered with illustrations from the music video, accompanied by short texts, questions, and interactive elements, including:
the sign for music in German Sign Language (DGS)
an open question visitors could answer with pens:
What does music mean to you?
excerpts from surveys with hearing-impaired participants
questions like:
Can you imagine experiencing music in VR?
Why do you go to concerts or clubs?
The exhibition was not intended exclusively for hearing-impaired audiences. Instead, it created a shared space where different perceptions of music could coexist — while raising awareness for hearing loss in a subtle, experiential way.
collaboration
Iquitos Bird was developed together with Franziska Hauber and Tom Simonetti.
For the concept and realization, we collaborated closely with hearing-impaired young people from a school in Augsburg, whose insights strongly shaped the project.
The illustrations are by Hanna Verwohlt, many of them created nearly ten years earlier. Music and imagery unexpectedly aligned through shared inspirations from jungle environments.
Additional sound recordings were contributed by Iven Simonetti, including field recordings from the Peruvian jungle — such as the distinctive call of the Iquitos Bird, which gives the project its name.
support & recognition
To launch the project, we started a Startnext crowdfunding campaign. With strong community support, we raised over 4,000 €.
Beyond financing, the campaign played a crucial role as a communication and awareness tool. From the beginning, it introduced the central theme of Iquitos Bird to a broader audience and opened a conversation about hearing loss, perception, and music — long before the exhibition and music video were released.
The project was further recognized in 2021 with the RoyStart Pop award (category: Video), one of Augsburg’s notable cultural awards, highlighting both its artistic approach and its social relevance.
