For many city dwellers who have fled the nest, a balik kampung trip is a chance to revisit the local haunts they will spend the rest of the year craving. Malaysian artist Shin Oh particularly misses Emporium Makan Klang, a now-defunct food court built in 1969 where muhibbah dictated the menu. But Oh and the local community which patronised some 70 hawker stalls that operated in the building can no longer return to this cherished hometown spot as it was demolished in 2019 to make way for the construction of the Light Rail Transit Phase 3 (LRT3). She has, however, dreamt up a way to immortalise a little piece of Klang for those who would like a second helping of nostalgia — through volumetric pixels, or voxels.
This digital art form stems from a computer animation technique used to generate 3D models for big names in the video game industry like Minecraft and Teardown or avatars for NFT metaverse projects like The Sandbox. Unlike the 2D version, voxel enables developers to add depth and detail to their work in the same way we used to build Lego models as children, evoking a…