What if architecture could feel, listen, and share our most intimate expressions of struggle and hope? Gaze to the Stars transforms MIT’s Great Dome, an iconic symbol of institutional knowledge, into a vehicle for empowering communities to share their stories and turn their eyes toward the city. Inspired by the motto per ardua ad astra—“through difficulties to the stars”—this project reimagines the Dome as a living canvas, reflecting not only the aspirations of those shaped by MIT, but also their resilience, vulnerability, and unspoken narratives of failure and transformation. Through a mosaic of gazes—lived experiences interwoven in civic sharing—the project asks whether watching itself can be reclaimed: not as surveillance or control, but as an opening toward vulnerability, care, and empathy. More than 200 participants entered a custom-built sensory pod where they shared dreams, fears, and longings in conversation with an AI voice embodied as the Dome itself. Their eye movements and spoken testimonies were recorded, with the summary of each story encoded in Braille and encoded with close-up video portraits of the participants’ eyes. Over three nights in March 2025, these visuals were projection-mapped across the 100-meter-wide Dome and livestreamed worldwide, transforming the building into a platform for civic storytelling—where audiences could decode the messages in real time.
To begin with, we designed an immersive pod equipped with AI (LLMs and computer vision) to capture the unique eye movements, and personal stories—the dreams, aspirations and struggles—of 200 volunteers. The pod experience was designed to be both mindful and therapeutic, fostering a space where participants might open up and share their personal stories. Much like the confessional, where the Catholics confess their sins to a priest hidden behind a screen, or like the psychoanalyst’s couch, where patients reveal their unconscious desires, the sensory pod becomes an intimate space for storytelling.
The pod invites participants to share their aspirations and fears. The interaction unfolds as a conversation. It begins with participants listening to the voices and stories of others, immersing themselves in their worlds. The pod then gently coaxes them with initial questions, such as: “What are you longing for?” or “What do you dream of becoming?” The pod responds to participants’ answers, offering feedback and asking follow-up questions to draw them ever deeper into their reflections.
On 12-13-14 March 2025, these eyes and their encoded stories, projected onto the MIT Great Dome, transformed it into a space of empathy and shared experience—one that inspires the public to reflect and reconsider their own place within a larger, evolving universe. Extending beyond the live installation, an interactive data visualization on the project website reveals patterns and connections across these emotional testimonies, turning private affect into shared civic presence.
By merging design, AI, and participatory art, Gaze to the Stars reclaims the gaze as an act of collective empathy, positioning architecture not as a static landmark, but as an active participant in human connection. This project contributes to ongoing discussions about the ethics of emotional and story collection, and the potential role of computational design and AI in fostering self-awareness and emotional reflection.
This project is presented as part of Artfinity , an Institute-sponsored event celebrating creativity and community at MIT.
- Behnaz Farahi
- Julian Ceipek
- Suwan Kim
- Chenyue 'XDD' Dai
- Sergio Mutis
- Frank Cong
- Haolei Zhang
- Yaluo Wang
- Nebus Kitessa
- Krystal Jiang
- Linda Xue
- Yaqi Li
- Jd Hagood
- Milin Tunsiricharoengul
- Pria Sawhney
- Jiaji Li
Credits
- Critical Matter Group, MIT Media Lab
- Dan Gilbert
- MIT Great Dome