JUNKIE

Spatial Experience Design

Junkie is a multi-sensory experience that represents the modern Glutton. It is a satirical commentary on society's ridiculous obsession with food and how we glorify this addiction. Through the medium of Augmented Reality, the project aims to critique and activate a self-reflection in the viewer's mind about their own over-consumption of food in the modern world of visual hunger and easy accessibility in the current Indian context. A scenario where people’s consumption habits are exponentially rising with increasing spending power and proving to be disastrous for the overall health of the people.

The Junkie Room was inspired by Mad Hatter's tea party table

from 'Alice in Wonderland'. The involvement of all five senses in

this spatial concept captivates people through psychedelic music,

trippy projection of motion graphics, food smells, actual food to be consumed with commentary to read, and also the interactive AR illustrations in the set-up.

There was also a small self-reflection activity to be done in the room

with project giveaways in the form of Fridge Magnets. All of these

elements led to people spending a long time in the space discussing

their consumption habits with me and with each other. 

The origin of Junkie started right from the research phase where I conducted an experiment to map food consumption with a sample group of young urban Indian adults who sent me their daily food intake over a period of time. Through the insights of this experiment, the idea to create an experiential space was born that would be interactive and self-reflective without being preachy and the aesthetics of the space would attract the user but the idea of the project itself would cause a sense of repulsion from overconsuming.

The AR illustrations add a great design idea too.

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Being a "foodie" is the new cool . But on a larger scale, food being a critical living necessity, over production of food to meet the demands of a growing population also has a grave environmental impact in terms of resources used. A lot of food produced ends up getting wasted which further adds to the problem of global warming. Food consumption patterns in the modern times cause health ailments like diabetes, obesity and even cancer. This project aims to make the viewer a little more mindful about their consumption to avoid the negative domino effect of the same.

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Special mention to Artivive for making AR accessible which really helped this project.