Centennial Drama Reimagined: An Immersive Experience of Intangible Cultural Heritage through Contextual Storytelling in Virtual Reality

The excavation of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) contextual information carried by cultural heritage (CH) presents new possibilities with the continuous advancement of digital technology. However, when visiting CH sites, due to physical limitations or conservation principles, audiences often focus only on the tangible aspects of CH, while neglecting or struggling to interpret the intangible cultural background. Therefore, presenting the rich intangible cultural contextual information associated with tangible CH is growing in significance, and virtual display methods are gaining prominence. In this work, we select the Shiwan pottery sculptures from over 100 years ago, located in the Chen Clan Ancestral Hall in China, as the subject of our CH research. We conduct a narrative analysis of the intended interpretation of its historical storytelling context. Based on this, we design a new system for embedding ICH narrative information into tangible CH, enabling their aligned comprehension, using 3D scene construction technology, motion capture and virtual reality (VR) technology. The system reimagines the storyline and spatial theatrical scene of Chinese local drama (Cantonese Opera) as ICH in the tangible CH. Results of a comparative user experiment show that the VR immersive interactive system enhances audiences’ aligned understanding of ICH contextual storytelling when visiting CH, and it generates a deep interest in ICH.