Meow Wolf: the art of immersive, ubiquitous computing
Most who know me are surprised to find that I have a younger brother who is an artist and a dreamer, in the best sense. As children, we were incredibly close, exploring the world together, and ourselves, always in search of meaning. I was always looking to how things are; he was always looking to how they could and should be. To this day, our starkly different views of the world, but also our deep love and respect for each other, mean that our conversations can be profoundly affecting and sometimes deeply troubling. We force each other to reconcile with foreign truths, he with logic, and I with beauty.
And so when I took my daughter south to visit him last weekend, I had some trepidation. He’s been in school learning art and family therapy. That’s scary enough, as he’s never been better at deconstructing me. But he’s also working part time at Meow Wolf, in Santa Fe, New Mexico, an art collective subsidized by George R.R. Martin of Game of Thrones. The stories he’s told me of time as a docent have always disturbed my sense of order.
Like any good art, Meow Wolf is hard to explain. It’s an art collective. But it’s also a museum. But really it’s more like a space for immersive, disorienting experiences. It’s full of children expressing their deepest instincts of play and adults trying to resurrect and fight those instincts. It’s full of rational minds encountering an unexplainable dream and young adults exploiting a space that encourages rule breaking. It’s a building full of images and experiences you’ve never seen, but it’s also a 10,000 square foot bowling alley full of craft next door to a Walmart. Like I said: as good art, there are no words.
I had two simultaneous experiences at Meow Wolf. One was a sense of deja vu, remembering a time in my young childhood where everything was new and to be discovered. I went into a fireplace and found myself staring the soft glow of mammoth skeleton in an ice cave. I peered into tiny peepholes and saw entire worlds. I read the diaries of broken children, seeing generations of psychosis dismantle their futures and their minds. I watched toddlers find private spaces in the blanket of soundscapes while their parents rummaged through a stranger’s cupboards. I opened closet doors and saw the underworld. The sheer, relentless assault on the certainty of my senses was overwhelming but intriguing.
The other experience was a sense of fascination with the elegant fusion of software and art. Nearly every object and space at Meow Wolf was brought to life by sensors and algorithms. Some of it invited interaction, in subtle, non-verbal ways saying hit me, poke me, tap me, touch me, hug me. Other objects hid, and waited to be discovered upon second look. Behind each of this was an underbelly of digital infrastructure, with lights, scaffolding, sensors, and CPUs. My brother told me of the “tech team” that kept this living, breathing world alive, their utter disinterest in the space’s immersive beauty, and their issue tracker that is the marker of the space’s constant demise and renewal.
While Meow Wolf was immersive, there were glimpses and reminders of the world outside. A band had a show scheduled inside, and was taking photos, testing amps. I watched them pretend they were in a normal venue, while their peripheries assured them they were not. I longed to visit the venue, not because of the music or the groupies, but because of the space they occupied, and the experiences it promised. A week later, I still wonder what I didn’t see and may never see.
Only a few times were computers dressed as themselves. The Linux box above sat in the den of the house I was invading. Every effort I made to interact with the machine was met with enforcement. The Charter, the police of the universe that ensure order over chaos, escalated it’s insistent reminders of the “rules”, until eventually, the machine would reboot and restore the order I’d demolished with my capacity for entropy. Computers in this space were not machines of functionality, but idols of imprisonment.
While the space had narrative, it also expressed a myriad of voices. Every wall was covered with the touch of individual artists and their expression of the space’s implied story. Every little detail was crafted by a different hand with a different vision, but the concepts evoked all spoke to the same narrative. This was a form of collective art, with shared vision, but defiant self-expression.
My instincts tell me to synthesize the utility of my experiences. What did I learn? How did it change me? What did I get from this? But to do so would be a refutation of Meow Wolf’s existence. It was what it is, and that is all. If you must know it’s value, go to Santa Fe and make your own meaning.
