Volker Kuchelmeister is currently working as lead immersive designer and Senior Research fellow at the UNSW felt Experience and Empathy Lab (feel)/Big Anxiety Research Centre [BARC].

He is an expert in presence, embodiment and place representation for immersive applications and has worked extensively in cinematography, interactive narrative, experimental imaging, spatial mapping, interactive systems, immersive visualisation and in the performing arts.

He has been instrumental in establishing media-art research labs (ZKM Centre for Art and Media Karlsruhe Germany – Multimedia Studio; UNSW iCinema Centre Media Lab and the UNSW National Institute for Experimental Art – Immersive Media Lab, UNSW Felt Experience and Empathy Lab). His immersive experiences, interactive installations and experimental video projects are exhibited in museums, galleries and festivals around the world.

As an immersive media designer, he has worked with the fEEL /BARC team on community projects on institutional abuse [parragirls past, present]; Aboriginal mental health and trauma [Uti Kulintjaku Waumananyi: The Song on the Wind]; exploring mental health/felt states in the body [Embodimap]; developing empathy for people with dementia, [The Visit] and current projects investigating trauma and place, [Hard Place/Good Place]. He has published on each of these projects in journals such as International Journal on Stereo & Immersive Media, Dementia: The International Journal of Social Research and Practice and FKT. Die Fachzeitschrift für Fernsehen, Film und elektronische Medien