Out of Touch / In Touch—Learning to Be Together in Virtual Reality

What does it feel like to hold someone's hand in virtual reality? You can't. And yet students who spent a semester together in social VR reported something that surprised even their instructors: a genuine sense of togetherness—of shared presence—that felt, at moments, startlingly real.  This event presents findings and experiences from Artistic Practice in the Metaverse, a seminar run at the Universität der Künste Berlin between 2022-2024, in which students from Fine Arts, Music, Communications, and Design spent a semester exploring virtual worlds (VRChat, RecRoom, Mozilla Hubs, AltspaceVR) as both creative medium and social space. The course was framed as a semester-long class trip. What it became was an unexpected inquiry into what presence, touch, and togetherness actually mean—and what we lose, and find, when we seek them through immersive technology.  The event opens with a short illustrated talk by the course leaders, followed by an interactive VR demo and discussion. The central section invites a small number of audience members to put on headsets and enter a VR world together; the rest of the audience follows via live projection. A facilitated group discussion closes the session, asking: what did touch mean in there? Can virtual worlds help us connect, learn and stay in touch?