Immersive performance Mads Perch
, US writer Lindsey Ferrentino’s debut at London’s National Theatre, is more than just a survivor story. It’s a visually arresting meditation on virtual reality exposure therapy.
The therapy was first trialled in 1997 by at the University of Washington Human Interface Lab in Seattle. The pair designed a virtual reality environment, Spiderworld, which enabled a phobic individual to safely encounter and interact with the object of their irrational fear – in this case, a 3D-rendered arachnid. After 12 sessions, the subject’s symptoms seemed to…
