The Awake

Be immersed in a dance-driven VR journey into the inner world of ALS patients, whose frozen bodies conceal minds and souls burning with resilience.

Vision becomes the primary anchor to reality for patients in the later stages of motor neurone disease – also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS. Twin interdisciplinary choreographers Hsieh Hsiao-Ting and Hsieh Hsiao-Wei invite you, too, to watch without moving. Poetic, abstract dance evokes ALS patients’ rich, heightened consciousness as everyday objects dissolve under the weight of illness: a motionless wheelchair; drifting curtains; a dining table for two; a fish in its bowl. Winner of the Humanity Award in the 2026 XR Competition at NewImages Festival in Paris, this meditative work entwines the sensory and virtual to express something hidden but intensely human.