The Last Bee asks a small, terrible question: what happens after the last one? Not the dramatic moment of disappearance — the long quiet that comes after, when the world has to keep going without the small thing it used to depend on.
The viewer enters the experience through a VR headset and meets two suited figures — half-astronaut, half-bee — drifting through a hexagonal honeycomb circuitry in search of what's left of the world they once kept alive. The black-and-yellow hazmat of their suits, the translucent insect wings, the bee-striped helmets: these aren't costumes. They're protective gear for a future where pollination has become an expedition.
The piece was selected for the New Images XR Development Market at NewImages Festival 2024, an annual gathering in Paris that brings together international curators, broadcasters and platforms to scout XR work in progress. The selection is competitive — it positions the project among the most-watched XR works in development in Europe that year.
Below: a short trailer, and a moment from the festival floor.
Two suits, one honeycomb.
NewImages Festival, Paris 2024.
The Last Bee was presented at the XR Development Market — the festival's curated showcase of works-in-development. The booth pictured here is set up with concept art and character design sheets behind it, the laptop showing the key art.
The Development Market puts works in front of international curators, broadcasters and producers looking for the next wave of XR — a step that often opens the door to co-production deals and platform releases.
Half astronaut, half bee.
A protective gear for a future without pollinators.
The suit fuses two visual languages — the industrial heaviness of a hazmat suit and the impossible delicacy of an insect. Black-and-yellow stripes that read as both warning and species. A helmet that closes around the head like a bee-keeper's mask. Wings that suggest function but might just be memory.
Two figures wear it. They move together through a world that no longer hums.