Art Game: Tomasz Wlazlak's Superheroes (2016)

Tomasz Wlazlak is a Polish multimedia artist whose work features video game imagery, motifs, and themes. His aesthetic is strongly influenced by 8-bit graphics. One of his latest works, Superheroes (2016), mixes sculptural elements like arcade game cabinets with interactive games inspired by classic coin-ops about historical figures like Sai Baba, Masutatsu Oyama, Padre Pio, and Ratan Manek, the eponymous super heroes.

All the games were programmed by Daniel Lewan.

As Wlazak explains:

I decided to use the form of arcade machines to create a climate of a "temple of gaming", i.e. recreate the mystical atmosphere of the arcades. Arcade machines are also supposed to subtly bring to mind the shape of confessionals. They are to partly belong to the realm of the sacred and partly to realm of the profane because arcades are "semiotic brothels of the machine age."

I love that quote by the way. It's from a seminal essay by John Fiske.​

The artwork was featured in the 2017 Gdańskim Biennale Sztuki curated by Grażyna Tomaszewska.

But my personal favorite is a previous project titled Tableau Vivant (2012), which looks like a homage to David Crane's Little Computer People (1985):

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