Art Game: Anthony Montuori's Harbor Islands (2016)

I cannot think of a game designer that has captured the zeitgeist better than Anthony Montuori.

His new game, Harbor Islands, will be installed at the Harbor Islands Welcome Center on the Greenway, in Boston, Ma. Inspired by the arcade classic Asteroids, Harbor Islands is the latest title in a serie

ames that include such modern classics as Ragz, Into the Void with Yves Klein, The Adventures of Sisyphus, Super Maria and more, all developed with Processing.

describes like this

Artist, video game maker, and art handler Anthony Montuori created the game to play itself based on the weather data collected from the harbor islands. Montuori describes the piece as “an inverted version” of Asteroids. His rendition of the game begins with one asteroid instead of many, and they proliferate instead of disappearing when they’re shot. The game incorporates variables collected on an hourly basis: temperature, wind bearing, wind speed, humidity, visibility, as well as the written forecast. Temperature determines the directions in which the ship moves, wind speed and direction determine the movements of asteroids, and the humidity dictates their rotation.

Here's an insightful interview with the artist.

"Anthony Montuori’s games illuminate the futility of the modern pursuit of success. Debtris, a spinoff of “Tetris,” allows the player to pay off their insurmountable student debt playing the popular computer game for minimum wage. In Into the Void, the player becomes Yves Klein and attempts to remain in the void for as long as possible and, as in life, it is a struggle to do that. In Sisyphus, the gamer assumes the role of the Greek king and pushes a boulder upwards, to remove it from a hole in the ground. As the boulder gets closer to the top, the task becomes more difficult until the boulder falls back down again. Push, struggle, repeat forever." (George Fifield, curator)

Anthony Montuori is an Artist/Video Game Maker who lives and works in Boston, MA. He went to college for his Associates degree in fine arts at Hudson Valley Community, then to Montserrat College of Art for his BFA, and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts for his MFA. His work has been exhibited at Howard Art Project, Boston CyberArts and Frame 301, among others, in such exhibitions a

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