Virtual worlds are pixel worlds. They try to be similar to the real world in a tricky way. Everything is made with informatic code. Some characteristics of the real world are not integrated in the algorithm, because they were forgotten or too complicate to calculate. For example, metal is not metal, but an image of metal. The developper or the designer has tried to give to a metal object some characteristics of the same object in the real world. It is easy to give to this object the right color. But what about some general physical properties, like weight and reflection? Avatars of virtual world can carry any big object in metal, because this object doesn't have any weight. And metallic surfaces don't make any reflection.

Users of virtual worlds forget often this fact. They are like the people in the cave of Plato, concentrated on the appearance of things. Sometimes they don't realize all the differences between virtual and real world, probably because they are fascinated by similarities.
This is right: faces, skin, hair and clothes are wonderful in Second Life. But avatars cannot admire their face in mirrors. Mirrors in Second Life are only metal textures. They don't reflex any image. This fact should question us about virtual worlds.

Mirrors and men have a long story, which ha begun when someone has realized that he can see his own face in an untroubled water. All myths and tales show that this story is not easy: men have trouble with their image.

Virtual worlds are maybe the newest chapter of this story. Men are building a reflection of their own world. Why Second Lifes' mirrors should reflect the faces of the avatars, if Second Life itself is a mirror? A mirror whose image is customable. A mirror we can play with. A mirror that we can enter.

Let's explore:

• a short story of the mirror
• three tales of reflection: Narcissus, Medusa and Perseus, Snow White
• the mirror as symbol of bad luck
• our daily life experience of mirrors
• how to build mirrors in Second Life
• pictures from Second Life with reflection
• some ressources: the Allegory of the Cave from Plato, the tale of Narcissus by Ovid

The exhibition at The Alpine Meadow Monastery is closed now.

Here are some pictures of the exhibition:

More about The Alpine Meadow Monastery

Blog: http://ammonastery.wordpress.com/
Flickr Group: http://www.flickr.com/groups/themonastery/ (you can contri