Kay Vasey first glimpsed – and heard- the digitally enhanced, boundary-crossing future of sustainability communications at the 2017 Glastonbury Festival.
Here, at Greenpeace’s customary donation stand, an immersive VR experience plunged revellers into the quivering jungles of the Amazon. “The first-person perspective allowed you to hear the voices of loggers and the cutting down of trees and see the enormity of the task. They doubled donations by transporting people there. That’s so powerful,” she effuses.
That same year, the technology lawyer established MeshMinds, a purpose-driven creative technology agency that sits distinctively at the intersection of art, technology and sustainability.
Among its innovative projects is an AR-powered call to eliminate ocean waste commissioned by ArtScience Museum and supported by UN Environment Programme (UNEP), as well as a partnership with Meta to reinterpret traditional arts in Taiwan and Korea through AR and VR.
In one experience, animated 3D horses teased from a Minhwa painting clop to an audio recording of the artist trotting out the symbolism of drawings adorning the animals’ caparisons.
It’s mind-bending stuff, when viewed next to the dour brochures and museum labels of legacy. “Many companies are now interested in telling their sustainability stories in a new and engaging way that can speak to Gen Z and beyond. They are the future custodians of our planet. How do we capture their imagination and stop them from doom scrolling?” says Vasey.
To that end, MeshMinds’ calling card manifests itself in bouncy interactive filters shared on social media and amplified by a youthful chorus of influencers. Vasey wants to help Asian “artivists” find their voice among the splintered commentary pervading a noisy digital landscape.
“Can we cultivate this new community of people in Asia who can act as a sounding board for someone like Greta Thunberg? Otherwise, you have this young white girl as the face of climate change who will not capture the hearts and minds of those in the Philippines or Laos.”
The Briton’s sustainability journey germinated in Brunei, where she spent the first 10 years of her life surrounded by nature — thanks to her father’s job fixing the sultan’s boats and helicopters.
“Every holiday, the Gurkhas would take groups of schoolchildren for treks in the jungle. Carrying our water bottles, they would cut through the forest with their parangs. We’d see all kinds of wildlife,” recounts the gamine mum of two.
Later, instead of the obligatory adolescent gap-year trip splayed out on hedonistic Spanish beaches, she embarked on environmentally-led overseas volunteer programmes, including one at a Mexican sea turtle conservation.
Despite her passion for the arts, she was discouraged by her Singaporean Chinese mother and British dad from pursuing it as a career. Which may explain why the former Director of Arts at British Council has found her second wind in helping admin-averse creatives navigate a cat’s cradle of legal intricacies, while connecting them to companies with a cause to proclaim.
But does she separate the wheat from the chaff, with large corporations fecklessly jumping on the ESG bandwagon? Vasey says MeshMinds works with companies that show an environmental or cultural skew, plus a clear call to action, rather than being exclusionary.
At a UNEP conference in Bangkok, MeshMinds‘ booth faced none other than the collectively reviled The Coca-Cola Company. “UNEP said the most important thing is to keep your enemies close. The brand is a bad polluter, but the worst way would be to alienate them. The organisation brings companies with loads of money, consumers and eyeballs to the table.”
Videography: Belle Chew
Photography: Mun Kong
Producer: Cara Yap
Styling: Chia Wei Choong
Hair & Makeup: Rick Yang/Artistry, Rick Yang/Artistry, assisted by Nikki Loh, using Shiseido and Keune
