Five Minutes With: Fiona Kilkelly
Tags: VR, Virtual Reality, 5 Minutes With, Five Minutes With, Immersive

Fiona has over 28 years’ experience working in the creative and digital industries, including leading roles in game-changing projects. She is a pioneer in leading change in the immersive technology industry, establishing Immerse UK in 2016 and continuing to be instrumental in connecting industry innovators with research and academic organisations and the public sector. Working across a portfolio of commercial and publically funded programmes, Fiona has just wrapped up running the AHRC Creative China programme at Beyond Conference and is currently Exec Producer on StoryFutures Roald Dahl Marvellous Children’s Charity Challenge. Kicking off 2021, Fiona will be supporting the ISCF Audience of the Future’s International programme, working on a new XR in healthcare report, and taking on the role of Chair at Eirmersive, the voice of the AR and VR sector in Ireland.

Fiona at the launch of the Immerse UK, Digital Catapult and PWC Immersive Economy reports, 2019. Credit: @AshaMarie18 on Twitter.

What is exciting you the most about the immersive industry right now?

The ingenuity of the UKs creators and innovators in AR and VR. Take the way in which festivals and events have found a niche route to audiences in VR, the sheer grit and determination of the manufacturing sector and the immersive folk who came together to produce medical ventilators at the start of the pandemic — new ideas just keep on coming.

You only have to look at the latest Creative XR cohort to see some seriously talented people being incredibly innovative in one of the most challenging times for the sector. Recently I was an assessor on the StoryFutures Academy UK and Canadian exchange programme and I was bowled over and inspired by the quality and quantity of established creatives from theatre and the visual arts looking to explore their art and ideas in immersive technology.

What advice would you give to your 18-year-old self?

At 18, I was half way through a fine art course in my home town of Galway where I couldn’t have asked for a better induction into the arts sector. But I lacked the self-confidence to commit to making a career out of painting.

When I left Uni I found the world of arts development instead. However, I would have loved to have been able to have the self-belief to stick with it as an artist and keep painting. So, my advice would have been to have faith that it would be ok. Fortunately, I have made that journey in other aspects of my life and now self-belief is one thing I do have, and I’ve picked my painting back up again. We get there in the end.

What and/or who is your source of inspiration?

Anything that makes life better. For me it’s the sea, I drag my teenage kids and husband in and they hate (then love) me for it, but it clears my head and is a source of strength. If I can’t access the sea, I love a good forest or if I can’t access that, a damp bit of green space somewhere. Followed by tea, I am the complete Irish cliché when it comes to tea—I never travel more than 10km without my flask and tea bags.

The book that inspired me to explore technology was Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace by Janet Murray, published in 1997. It blew my mind open and set off a hunger for how technology enabled creative expression and deeper more personal experiences. I have only recently discovered the Japanese installation artist, Chiharu Shiota, @chiharushiota — drop-dead inspiration in one hit.

What has been your biggest business challenge in the past 12 months?

I guess at first, I had some worries that working as a freelance consultant in this space would be challenging, I started just as the pandemic and lockdown kicked in, so the timing was not ideal. But it hasn’t proven to be the case (yet!) and I love it. I am fortunate to have the choice to work with people I respect and admire on fantastic projects and I am very grateful to have these new opportunities.

What is your favourite thing about your job?

Being at the start of something new all the time, with AR and VR we are still in the days of ‘firsts’ and new development and new innovations are breaking ground on a daily basis. It’s inspiring and impossible not to get an explosion of new ideas each time I come across something new. Now, working for myself and in collaboration with others, it’s great to be able to get to work on some new ideas, learn new things, and share what I’ve learned and my experiences with others.

And some just for fun!

What is something you think everyone should do at least once in their lives?

Skydive. I skydived in New Zealand over Lake Taupo, it was sheer terror followed by sheer exhilaration. Making the jump out of a door on the side of a plane, 9,000 feet high in the sky with a tiny little spec of a lake below you, your target landing spot, takes you places you never think you can emotionally go. It is deafening loud with the roar of the engines followed, split seconds later, by pure silence as you drop away from the plane, into freefall and a different world below.

Are you a morning person or a night owl?

Morning all the way.

If you could have a superpower, what would it be?

Time travel. I was walking up Kensington Church Street today and I had an overwhelming desire to know what it was like 150 years ago. But I have a feeling someone is going to come up with a very nice VR experience to help me do that in the near future. I think AR and VR are the next best thing to a superpower we can get, which is, now that I think about it, why I love working in this space.

Tell us something that would surprise us.

Not many people know this but I am also a craniosacral therapist, which means I support the body’s inherent ability to self regulate and self-correct through working with muscular-skeletal and central nervous systems. As a bodyworker and immersive tech advocate, I am really interested in how VR can enable us to feel better connected with ourselves. Whether that’s through having a better sense of presence in our bodies or as a way of accessing the parts of ourselves which we ordinarily may find hard to explore.

Follow Fiona over on Twitter @FKilkelly.