Voidopolis

Project Website: voidopolisbook.com

A hybrid digital artistic and literary project in the form of an augmented reality book made to disappear, Voidopolis retells Dante's Inferno as if it were set in pandemic-ravaged New York City. A first-of-its-kind publication from the MIT Press, Voidopolis can only be deciphered through a bespoke AR app published alongside the book.

Every detail of the story is crafted to evoke loss: the stock photographs of New York City with humans wiped away, the lipogrammatic AI-generative text missing the letter e. Over a period of months, the app works to decay the elements of the story just as memory might, leaving behind foggy imagery and half-remembered bits of language. Each July 1, the book resets, beginning anew the cycle of its own vanishing.

Voidopolis initially unfolded in a series of now-deleted Instagram posts on Kat Mustatea’s feed @kmustatea beginning on July 1st, 2020, and has since been exhibited internationally in a variety of digital and physical formats.

CREDITS: Voidopolis by Kat Mustatea, 2023 The MIT Press Leonardo Series | Book design and algorithmic decay: Studio Process | Afterwords: Charlotte Kent, Arielle Saiber | App Design: DOTDOT Studio |

FUNDING: The MIT Press Fund for Diverse Voices | Open Austria Art and Tech Lab | The US Embassy in Vienna | Café Royal Cultural Foundation Literary Grant | An Art Company

AWARDS: Digital Dozen Breakthroughs In Storytelling 2024 | Lumen Prize Shortlist 2023 | Winner of the Arts And Letters ‘Unclassifiable’ Prize For Literature | Winner of the Dante Prize, Dante Society London | Ars Electronica Prize Shortlist 2021 | Chautauqua Janus Prize For Literature Finalist 2021