We observed and recorded how visually impaired people create memory maps, such as using echoes to grasp spatial dimensions, or wind direction and smells to orient themselves. They have their own ways of navigating space. We tried to recreate these memory maps from different perspectives, exploring how the same spatial memory can be understood through different cognitive tools. Eventually, these representations of spatial memory will be reworked into an art installation that centres on faith and explores the world’s edge. Another strand of our research involves an interactive game that relies on audience participation. Audience voices become measuring tools, ultimately combined and distilled into a voice-controlled compass—a new kind of white cane for people with visual impairments.

In this work, sound plays two entirely different roles: first, the interviewees’ memory maps will be transformed further into a sound installation that can be “touched” and “heard”. The resulting soundscape signifies a transformation of not only their worldview but also of how their geographical concepts become various soundscape designs within the exhibition. Second, sound becomes the very medium to reinterpret the mapmaking process. Through engaging audio exercises, the audience will be turned into measuring devices that can communicate with visually impaired individuals. Since inanimate objects cannot be heard, can we develop a special ability to make “them” voice themselves, allowing us to measure the world?

A key interviewee in this phase of the research was Miu Law’s uncle, a pastor with retinitis pigmentosa which caused gradual vision loss until he became blind. A key point of the study is whether certain shared family memories— details of festive celebrations, how relatives dressed and the ancestral home—remain vivid in his mind, or have faded over time. Is visual disability a sensory impairment affecting only the present, or does it also reshape memories and the past? At the same time, we revisit, through the lens of religious faith, the worldview built primarily on “seeing”: does seeing the world truly mean grasping it more fully?

We will put together our experience in theatre and expertise in sound art to share our findings through sound installations and collective sound games. The presentation will take the form of a film screening followed by a launch. Through engaging games and myth-inspired installations, we hope to extend non-disabled individuals’ imagination of what life is like for their visually impaired counterparts and to cultivate a more inclusive and enriched shared experience.