Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 13 - City Sketch, 2013, machinima based on live performance, 2013
Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 16 - City Stroll, machinima based on live performance, 2013
Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 15, The Singularity's "Organs and Limbs" farm, machinima based on live performance, 2013
Victor Morales is one of the most exciting artists experimenting with video games today. Born in Caracas, Venezuela, Morales received a Law Degree from Universidad Catolica Andres Bello, in Caracas in 1990. In 1992, Morales completed a Master’s degree in Technology Applied to the Arts at New York University’'s Gallatin Division. He spent more than a decade in New York City and he is currently living in Berlin. Since 2003, Morales "has been obsessed with the art of video game modifications and has implemented different game engines into most of the works he has participated in or created. His solo work consists of an exploration of video game engines as simulation environments, where death and physics are transformed into dramatic and comedic real time performance." (Morales)
He has performed a number of solo shows in art galleries, festivals, and events, including Performance Space 122, The Little Theater in New York City, The Collapsable Hole in Brooklyn, and Gessner Allee in Zurich, Theater Freiburg, and The Hau in Berlin. Morales' performances with game engines (CryEngine in primis) have consistently challenged the nature of simulation.
One of his most celebrated pieced by Morales is "Vogelstimmen" (below), performed along Messiaen's 'un Sourire with the Tonkünstler-Orchestra at the Festspielhaus in St Pölten, Austria on September 26, 2009. It was created with CryEngine 2.
Morales creates dynamic visual art through unconventional performative gestures, both technologically subversive and aesthetically dissonant,as they explore - and exploit - glitches, errors, and bugs. Images are produced in real time and machinima is mostly used as an archival medium. Morales' performances also remediate the medium of puppetry. Consider, for instance, his "Marionette" project (2010):
His new series, launched in February 2013, is entitled "30 Seconds or More". A series of animation created with the CryEngine. It all began with this video, "Mushrooms", a "[S]ound reactive animation where only the camera's position and FOV are affected by the lowest frequencies of the audio. This is rendered in Real Time and it was possible thanks to hendrikp OSC plugin to drive the sound data into the engine" (Morales):
Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 01, Beyond the Magic Mushrooms, machinima based on live performance, 2013
Since then, Morales has produced several more iterations. Most of them use a soundtrack by Pal Asle Pettersen. Some are beatifully abstract, like this one:
Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 12, ColorHead, machinima based on live performance, 2013
Some are set in Garry's Mod and use Kinect. Here's an example:
Victor Morales, 30 seconds or more 09, After 7 rums with Coconut Water, machinima based on live performance, 2013.
It is fascinating to follow this organic, generative process online.
LINK: Victor Morales & 30SecondsOrMore
Submitted by Matteo Bittanti
