GAMESCENES

EVENT: HOMO LUDENS: VIDEOGAMES TO UNDERSTAND THE PRESENT (JULY 20 - OCTOBER 31 2021, MADRID, SPAIN)

Homo Ludens: Videogames to understand the present

July 20 - October 31 2021

CaixaForum Madrid

Paseo del Prado, 36
28014 Madrid, Spain

Curated by Luca Carrubba

Designed by Domestic Data Streamer studio

Produced by Fundación "La Caixa"

Opening Conference: July 20 2021

"The exhibition Homo Ludens proposes an anthropological journey through the playful dimension of human beings through video games, a cultural, aesthetic and artistic phenomenon that is essential in contemporary mass culture. It is currently estimated that more than 2.5 billion people are video game players. Starting from the centrality of the game in our lives, the exhibition's journey approaches video games in a broad and holistic sense, and addresses the role of play as a regulating practice of human activity, both in the history of culture and today. Rather than being a history of video games, the exhibition provides a basically anthropological vision, bringing together culture and technology, industry and art.

The content of the exhibition combines examples of video games with contemporary artworks by the following artists: Rasheed Abueideh, Anna Anthropy, Matteo Bittanti and the collective IOCOSE, Ricardo B. Brasilero, Daniel Canogar, Robbie Cooper, Jake Elliott, Bruno Federico, Auriea Harvey and Michaël Samyn, Roc Herms, Agustina Isidori, David Jaumandreu, Ge Jin, Tamas Kemenczy and Ben Babbitt, Josep Lago, Jorge Paris, Nadège Mazars, MesquitaFMS, Hamilton Mestizo, Juan Naharro Gimenez, Roman Pilipey, Everest Pipkin, David Ramos, Linnea Rheborg, Mario von Rickenbach and Christian Etter, Pietro Righi Riva, Monica Rikić, Skawennati, Octavi Serra, Bill Viola and USC Game Innovation Lab, and Robert Yang.

In the exhibition, themes such as the anthropological roots of the game that are transferred to the video game, its million-dollar industry, the influence of video game aesthetics in other disciplines such as art and design, identity in a world where the real coexists with the virtual, among other issues.

The exhibition invites to an interactive and participatory tour in which the viewer acts as a gamer, although without playing at any time with the video games on display. The viewer chooses the itinerary from a central square that acts as an antechamber and distribution space of the exhibition. The visitor can interact with the exhibition through a device -the Coin-, an object that allows the viewer to build his or her opinion as he or she answers a series of questions. The answers also allow a collective knowledge of the participation of all visitors. On the large screen installed in the last room of the exhibition, a community of avatars is projected, representing, in real time, the accumulated data of all the visitors to the exhibition.

In this way, the exhibition provides a new perspective on the concept of the gamer and shows a gamified world in which life and play merge and in which we are all, in one way or another, gamers. This hypothesis, based on the work of sociologist and game scholar Daniel Muriel, is reflected in the video essay "Gameworlds: the video-gamification of the real" by Luca Carrubba and Daniel Muriel, directed by LaviniaNext and produced by "La Caixa" Foundation.

The exhibition also includes a catalog (in Spanish) that presents in detail all the works installed and proposes a reflective framework for their interpretation. This publication, which I had the pleasure of thinking, coordinating and writing, also includes texts by guest authors such as Oliver Perez La Torre, Flavio Escribano, Luján Oulton, Eurídice Cabañes, Carlos Scolari and Daniel Muriel.

The exhibition will be traveling during the next  four years touring all major cities in Spain. So if you do not have time to get to Madrid you can see the exhibition soon in Barcelona, Sevilla, Zaragoza, Valencia, Palma, Tarragona, Girona." (Luca Carrubba)

LINK: Homo Ludens

EVENT: KENT SHEELY (JULY 9 - JULY 22 2021, ONLINE)

Kent Sheely

Ice Cream President

digital video, black and white, sound, 06’ 37” (United States)

July 9 - July 22 2021

Introduced by Matteo Bittanti

vral.org

Fifteen years after its first appearance, Hitman: Blood Money’s disarming yet lethal ice cream truck returns in this bleak machinima that focuses on a much bigger tragedy. What happens when the video game imaginary breaks the fourth wall and enters the so-called “reality”? You may get two scoops of Ice Cream President.

Kent Sheely (b. 1984, United States) is a new media artist based in Los Angeles. His work draws both inspiration and foundation from the aesthetics and culture of video games, examining the relationships between real and imagined worlds. Much of his work centers around the translation and transmediation of symbols, concepts, and expectations from game space to the real world and vice versa, forming new bridges between simulation and lived reality.

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EVENT: UBERMORGEN (JUNE 25 - JULY 8 2021, ONLINE)

UBERMORGEN

Chinese Gold (Boom)

June 25 - July 8 2021

Introduced by Matteo Bittanti

vral.org

Approximately fifteen years ago, UBERMONGEN introduced Chinese Gold, a sui generis investigation of the gold farming phenomenon, that is, the practice of playing a massively multiplayer online game with the specific aim of acquiring in-game currency and later selling it for real-world money. An ambitious mixed (hyper)media project featuring texts, machinima, and re-appropriated prints, Chinese Gold brought to the surface the highly exploitative nature of video game playing. Thousands of Chinese players worked nonstop in the digital equivalent of sweatshops to generate virtual currency, digital items, and even full characters for Western, mostly North American and European, players. This lo-res found footage video, originally uploaded on Google and appropriated by the artists, showcases a teleportation hack in World of Warcraft, repeated over and over by Chinese gold farmers. Interestingly, this emergent practice was exploited, among others, by a company managed by Steve K. Bannon, an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker, who served as the White House’s chief strategist in the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. Bannon was just one of several American intermediaries who set up companies that hired these digital workers. UBERMORGEN’s prophetic examination of gold-farming highlights the complex interplay between gaming and politics, ideology and capitalism. In the age of gamified economies, trade wars, pandemics, conspiracy theories, pervasive trolling, and armed insurrections, Chinese Gold speaks of the current moment.

UBERMORGEN is an artist duo founded in 1995. Actionist autist lizvlx and pragmatic visionary Hans Bernhard are net.art pioneers and media hackers widely recognized for their high-risk research into data & matter, conceptual art, haute couture websites and polarizing social experiments. CNN called them 'Maverick Austrian Business People' during their Vote-Auction online project. They reached a global audience of 500 million while challenging the FBI, CIA, and NSA during the US presidential election. In 2005, they launched their acclaimed EKMRZ Trilogy, a series of conceptual hacks – Google Will Eat Itself, Amazon Noir, and The Sound of eBay. UBERMORGEN controls 175 domains. Their exhibitions include Liverpool Biennial; Whitney Museum (2020); New Museum, New York; Somerset House, London; Haifa Museum of Art, Israel/Palestine (2019); Wei-Ling Contemporary Malaysia; HKW, Berlin; ZKM; National Art Gallery, Sofia (2017); ICA Miami; Mahatma Gandhi Institute, Mauritius (2015); Serpentine Galleries, London (2014); Kunsthal Aarhus; Ars Electronica, Austria; MoMA Ljubljana; ArtScience Museum, Singapore (2013); 3331 Arts Chiyoda, Japan (2012); Centre Pompidou; Gwangju Design Biennale; WRO Media Art Biennale (2011); Prague Biennale (2009); Biennale of Sydney (2008); MOCA Taipei (2007); The Premises, Johannesburg; ICC Tokyo (2005); SFMOMA, USA (2001).

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EVENT: RADICAL GAMING – IMMERSION SIMULATION SUBVERSION (02.09.2021 – 14.11.2021)

Radical Gaming - Immersion Simulation Subversion

An exhibition curated by Boris Magrini

September 2 - November 14 2021

Opening: Wednesday, 01.09.2021

HeK
House of Electronic Arts Basel
Freilager-Platz 9
CH–4142 Münchenstein/Basel

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Theo Triantafyllidis, Pastoral, 2019 , screenshot. (Courtesy of the Artist)

This is the most important Game Art exhibition of 2021, by the way.

Press release

The international group exhibition Radical Gaming presents a selection of artists who investigate the structures, technologies and aesthetics of a global gaming industry. Their works are characterised by a particularly unconventional approach to employing the immersion and interaction inherent to video games, whose common narratives and stereotypes they subversively undermine.

This new generation of artists use contemporary game programming technologies to create virtual and augmented reality experiences, immersive environments, interactive stories and multimedia installations. By appropriating the medium for their artistic practice, they create alternative perspectives on identity construction, gender issues and social change. Their refusal to abide by the commercial and recreational logic of video games, sets the scene for their progressive, uncompromising, and thought-provoking works.

Artist: Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley, Leo Castañeda, Sara Culmann, Debbie Ding, Keiken, Lawrence Lek, Mikhail Maksimov, Cassie McQuater, Sahej Rahal, Nicole Ruggiero, Jacolby Satterwhite, Eddo Stern, Theo Triantafyllidis, Miyö Van Stenis, Lu Yang

LINK: Radical Gaming 

PROJECT: SUPERMOVA

Lera Malchenko, 1/2 of the collective fantastic little splash, has recently launched the project Supermova, a new series of videos focusing on developing media and their impact on human interactions.

""Why are we sometimes so "therapeutically" outspoken on social media; how virtual worlds without moderators push us to invent political solutions? How emotions can become human interfaces? How does the Ukrainian political reality become algorithmic? The goal is to notice and document how we change through our digital communication tools: social networks, computer games, virtual worlds and other interactive digital platforms. The author of the project is journalist and artist Lera Malchenko. Supermova is supported by the European Union under the House of Europe program initiative.

The videos focus on three main areas:

e-bodily practices: "physical sensations and close relationships between distanced people, technological sexuality (Marshall McLuhan), e-corporeality, closeness of constant distancing"
2. emotions as human interfaces as a level of direct interaction between user and other people through social media; ability of the algorithms to retranslate emotional states, disrupt human behavior, and become an additional tool for solidarity ("leaderless revolutions"); fusion at the collective level (Vilém Flusser's concept of "intersubjective dialogue")
3. social e-practices; homo ludens and projections of worlds: games, virtual worlds as a space for inventing other languages and new political implements, potential spaces for projecting alternative configurations."

Episode 3 episode features Austrian Game Art collective Total Refusal and Matteo Bittanti. The main topic is politics and video games.

LINK: Supermova

EVENT: LI ZHU (JUNE 11 - JUNE 24 2021, ONLINE)

Li Zhu

All Beings Are Suffering  

June 11 - June 24 2021

Introduced by Matteo Bittanti

vral.org

All Beings Are Suffering is part of Human Dust, an ongoing project that comprises self-generating scenes of human-like intelligence created by Li Zhu with Unity 3D. These simulated creatures reproduce themselves endlessly, floating in the air and multiplying at a frantic pace. As the artist says, “We don’t know whether such a human-like AI would have consciousness, but its presence will definitely confuse real humans’ consciousness. At least, because I heavily rely on computers to create my artwork, my own consciousness seems to be constantly washed away by algorithms. In a data flood, ‘real’ meanings that may exist in my art quickly decompose. Reality disappears; only a torrent of tumbling image data remains.”

Li Zhu is a Chinese-Canadian artist and scholar who uses new technologies such as video games, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, and social media to create novel ways of understanding reality. Li Zhu has an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She received a B.A. in Visual And Intermedia Arts from the University of Quebec in Montreal, Canada. She studied at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Paris and McGill University. Her work has been exhibited in China, France, Canada, and the United States. Recent exhibitions include I Think (solo, 2017) in Guangzhou, China, ON AURA (group, 2021) in Montreal, and Backyard Stories (group, 2020) in Chicago. She is currently working and living in Chicago.

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RESOURCE: HOW TO WIN AT PHOTOGRAPHY ONLINE SUPPLEMENT

Fotomuseum Winterthur new exhibition How to Win at Photography's online supplement is not a replica of the in situ exhibition, but rather an archive of information related to all-things-playful-image-making.

It will grow, so keep an eye on it.

LINK: How to Win at Photography Online Supplement

EVENT: HOW TO WIN AT PHOTOGRAPHY – IMAGE-MAKING AS PLAY (JUNE 5 - OCTOBER 10 2021, WINTERTHUR, SWITZERLAND)

 

How to Win at Photography - Image-Making as Play

June 5 - October 10 2021

Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland

Curated by Marco de Mutiis and Matteo Bittanti 

official site

How to Win at Photography – Image-Making as Play explores the relationship between photography and play. It investigates the notion of image play, creating unexpected connections between the history of photography, the gamification of the visible as well as practices of image making with and within computer games.

The group exhibition How to Win at Photography includes more than forty positions from contemporary and 20th century photography. Through an assemblage of multimedia artworks and vernacular images, the exhibition questions the very meaning and function of photography today.

 

Are we playing with the camera or is the camera ultimately playing us? Are we really in charge or are we mere pawns in larger technical, social, cultural and economic networks? What can a playful photographer achieve on a political and sociocultural level? Who and what is performing the act of seeing and capturing – humans, machines or a combination of both? Who is playing along? And finally, can this game be won? These are just some of the questions posed by How to Win at Photography. The exhibition invites visitors to focus on the playful aspects of photography. It looks at artists and photographers who play with – and sometimes against – the camera, document the environments of video games and question the notion of identity, gender and class.

With works by: Cory Arcangel, Aram Bartholl, Dorothée Elisa Baumann, Justin Berry, Julius Brauckmann, Alan Butler, Claude Cahun, Cibelle Cavalli Bastos, Dries Depoorter & Max Pinckers, Philipp Dorl, Constant Dullaart, Harun Farocki, Christopher Graves, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Beate Gütschow, Jon Haddock, Emily Hadrich, Florence Henri, Roc Herms, John Hilliard, Yuyi John, Rindon Johnson, Andy Kassier, Sherrie Levine, Gloria López Cleries & Sive Hamilton Helle, René Mächler, Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs, Joan Pamboukes, Steven Pippin, Michael Reisch, Tabor Robak, Ria Patricia Röder, Lorna Ruth Galloway, Ed Ruscha, Emma Agnes Sheffer, Cindy Sherman, Guido Segni, Andrew Stine, Petra Szemán, Akihiko Taniguchi, Danielle Udogaranya, Coralie Vogelaar, Tamás Waliczky and Ai Weiwei.

In collaboration with the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts and the Centre for the Study of the Networked Image at London South Bank University.

There will be several events planned between now and October, some in situ, some online, so stay tuned for more.

LINK: How to Win at Photography

EVENT: GWENI LLWYD AND OWEN DAVIES (MAY 28 - JUNE 10 2021, ONLINE)

Gweni Llwyd and Owen Davies

Becoming a Legend

May 28 - June 10 2021

Introduced by Luca Miranda

vral.org

 

The practice of customizing characters and assets in video games has a long tradition within vernacular as well as avant-garde subcultures. In fact, artists have often pursued this route to create their artworks. Few, however, reach the meta playful levels of Becoming a Legend which introduces the imperious character of Da Man!, a post-human, virtual übermensch, a diabolical, green-haired “divin codino”. Created with/in the popular video game Pro Evolution Soccer, Da Man! embodies the notion of toxic masculinity and the neoliberalist mantra of self-optimization.

Gweni Llwyd (she/her) is a Welsh artist based in Cardiff. Her practice reflects on a human condition caught between tactile physicality and intangible digital realms. Predominantly working in video, 3D animation, and installation, Gweni creates abstracted rhythms and narratives, mirroring the often chaotic, disjointed nature of the contemporary world by collecting, modifying and rearranging the most disparate sources and materials, including first hand and found footage, game engines and concrete artifacts. She is also co-founder of RAT TRAP, a collective of artists and musicians that find their own routes through the maze of protocols and ways of doing things.

Owen Davies (he/him) is a Welsh filmmaker based in Cardiff. Mainly working in live-action narrative film, his work revolves around the limits of human connection and interaction. Owen’s upcoming short film Arwel’s House, funded by Ffilm Cymru and the BBC, is shooting in July and will air on BBC4 in the UK later this year. The film follows the mother of a dead YouTube star as she gives tours of his childhood home in South Wales to fans from around the world. In 2018, he was shortlisted for the Armani Laboratorio where judge David Kajganich (Suspiria, The Terror) described his script Money Now as “just fantastic — a kind of moral emergency for the modern age that left me both queasy and totally fascinated.” 

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EVENT: CASSIE MCQUATER (MAY 14 - 27 2021, ONLINE)

Cassie McQuater

HALO

May 14 - 27 2021

Introduced by Gemma Fantacci

vral.org

 

In these six animated paintings presented as a single channel video, the artist reenacts situations and motifs from the first-person shooter series Halo and the erotic videogame Dream Stripper. Conceived as a dynamic, virtual collage, HALO shows short stock animation loops of characters dying over and over, with koi, dining chairs, asteroids, guns, flowers, torches, pinball machines, candles, and discarded pillows floating around them, creating a hypnotic motion.

Cassie McQuater is an American artist working with digital media, developing and designing video games and other interactive pieces and installations. Her practice involves hours of surfing the net, mining for digital artifacts, and repurposing them as a way to reflect on and reinvent our relationship with interactive storytelling. McQuater won the Nuovo Award (plus an honorable mention for Excellence in Design) at the 2019 Independent Games Festival for her browser-based game Black Room. Her work has been exhibited internationally. McQuater lives and works in Los Angeles.

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