Digital Reconstruction of the Paradox—Escher’s Relativity

The research intends to address a field of digital representation that is still little investigated, the environmental exploration in AR (Augmented Reality) and XR (Extended Reality) of visual paradoxes. The case study examined is the reproduction of the well-known lithograph "Relativity" produced by M.C. Escher in 1953. The workflow thus outlined starts with a rigorous reading of the perspective setting of the work between the decoding of the fundamental entities, restitution of the three-dimensional spaces, graphic analysis of the architectural environment, as well as the logic of the paths represented for a punctual reproduction of the 3D model, creating various versions and interpretations of the architecture in terms of colors, materials, lights, and spatiality. The digital reproduction has been adapted and inserted into an AR software, to make the new virtual concept usable in the real architectural environment and to provide the user with a first-person experience of the paradox, in the full spirit of immersive media. The observer, depending on the point of view from which he will make the surrounding space his own, will see an above and below that are always different and never reconcilable with the rest of the users of the surrounding environment, making the two realities differ, albeit coinciding in time and space. In the environment used in AR, this 'displacement' will therefore be highlighted by the transposition into real space of the lithography, calling into question the concept of gravitational force in the case of use by means of visors.