Completed under the supervision of Guylaine Champoux, Lecturer at UQTR.

Gabriel Mondor & Chentian Zhang

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Overview

Mickey is a collaborative installation about spatiality, perception, and trust. A 3D object is hidden behind an inaccessible curtain. Six cameras inside capture partial live views, and six screens outside form a circle around it. Spectators must move, compare fragments, and mentally reconstruct what they cannot access directly—then confront how much belief is required to trust the screen.

 

Project Facts

Role: Co-creator / Installation design and system layout

Team: Gabriel Mondor & Chentian Zhang

Context: Gallery installation using live video as the only access channel

Tools: Curtain enclosure; six cameras; six screens; live feeds

Outputs: A circular viewing system that forces reconstruction from fragments

 

The UX Question

How might we design a viewing system that prevents a complete view, yet still enables meaning-making through movement and comparison?

How do we reveal the fragile trust placed in live images of an inaccessible reality?

 

Audience & Journey

• Visitors face an impenetrable curtain and can only see the object through six live screens.

• Each screen imposes a predefined viewpoint, translating 3D volume into partial 2D fragments.

• Because the screens form a circle, spectators cannot see all views at once and must move to reconstruct.

• Time suggests simultaneity, yet the work asks whether what is seen could still be simulation.

• They leave aware that “evidence” often collapses into images plus trust.

 

Key Design Decisions

• Made the object physically inaccessible so mediation is unavoidable.

• Used six distinct camera angles to force mental reconstruction.

• Arranged screens in a circle to prevent totality and require bodily navigation.

• Kept the feed live so time becomes the main cue of simultaneity.

• Chose a Mickey figurine as a mass-culture symbol tied to simulacra, masking profound reality and the Disneyland logic of manufactured reality.

• Framed the work as transdisciplinary, with perception changing from entry to exit.

 

Build / Prototype / Iterate

The installation is a controlled perceptual system: an unreachable interior and a mediated exterior linked only by six live images. I iterated the camera angles and screen placement so each view is distinct, and the circular layout reliably prevents a “single complete view.”

 

1. Place cameras for clearly different partial perspectives.

2. Tune screen circle so no position yields a full overview.

3. Validate that the live connection foregrounds time while sustaining doubt.

 

Outcome

The piece consistently triggers investigative viewing: spectators walk, compare, and reconstruct—then question what the screens truly guarantee.