About Heather Dunaway Smith — Spatial Artist, Creative Director, and AR/VR/MR Artist based in Oregon
I believe wonder changes people. I still do.
My work invites people to step into wonder: to see the world around them as if for the first time, to feel a deeper connection to place, and to experience the ordinary miracle of being alive — a body on a planet, in a solar system, in a galaxy, among trillions of galaxies, in an ever-expanding universe. Wonder expands what feels possible. Creativity, optimism, and the desire to make things better tend to follow.
I'm a storyteller who changes mediums depending on the story I'm trying to tell. I grew up in a family of interdisciplinary artists, so working with whatever tools are available has always been my way. Emergent technology has become one of the most powerful of those tools.
I grew up exploring the woods of Poetry, Texas (real place!) with a pencil in hand and a dog on my trail. Some things never change. I was trying to capture what the natural world kept revealing to me. I've never stopped.
I started studying playwriting in New York City, drawn to the idea of building worlds people could step inside. An early role at Apple changed everything — I realized I could create story that put the audience inside it, not outside looking in. I went on to earn a degree in Interactive Multimedia, and the work grew from there through XR, games, virtual worlds, and public installation — toward what it is now: physical space with digital overlay, built for bodies and presence.
I'm a former Adobe AR Art Resident and part of the first cohort of creators working with Snap's AR glasses and Meta's Quest headsets. The Light We Bring, shown at Dublin Winter Lights Festival, was the first public AR artwork made for glasses in Ireland — and it's the kind of work that's come to define my practice: large-scale, shared, built for bodies in public space. Exhibitions have taken the work to Art Basel Miami Art Week, FutureDays in Seoul, CADAF Paris, and Adobe MAX, where I've also spoken and curated the AR Art Gallery. More and more, the work I'm drawn to is public. Wonder shared between people compounds. It creates movements. It reminds us we are far from alone.
