GAMESCENES

OPEN CALL FOR DIGITAL ART COMMISSIONS: PEREZ ART MUSEUM, FLORIDA (DEADLINE: JUNE 30 2025)

press release

(MIAMI, FL — April 30, 2025) — Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) is thrilled to announce its inaugural open call for digital art commissions from the crossroads of the Americas. The museum’s first-of-its-kind program offers financial support to produce experimental digital artwork across South Florida, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the African Diaspora. Selected artists may be awarded between $1,000–$15,000 during an estimated 12-month period, expanding and advancing the museum’s presentation, study, and interpretation of international contemporary digital art.

The open call for digital art commissions launches on April 30, 2025. The application deadline is June 30, 2025, at 11:59pm PST.

The open call fosters the creation of innovative digital artworks that reflect PAMM's unique position at the crossroads of the Americas, bolstering artistic representation and reproduction within these regions. The open call aims to expand scholarship and engagement with digital art, advancing the museum’s mission to lead in the presentation, study, and interpretation of international contemporary digital art.

“This open call seeks to bolster new media practices across PAMM’s purview and reroute the history of digital art beyond what is typically shown in museums and galleries,” said Jay Mollica, PAMM senior director of digital engagement. "The economic, artistic, and scholarship opportunities built into the open call are vital for our digital arts ecosystem to thrive across South Florida, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the African Diaspora,” said Lauren Monzón, program manager of digital engagement.

Applicants can submit proposals for original projects in any production phase, including pre- to post-production. Successful digital art proposals will use the internet and digital processes to conceptually and practically shape their projects, including many disciplines spanning video art, film, augmented reality, net art, 3-D sculpture, video games, virtual reality, generative art, as well as forms yet to be discovered.

There is no fee for the museum’s open call for digital art commissions. Proposals must be submitted electronically through PAMM’s application portal here.

Learn more about the open call, applicant eligibility, evaluation criteria, and how to apply by clicking here.

GAME ART: HUGO PILATE’S LAGARES DO ALVARÁ (2023)

Lagares do Alvará is a virtual environment created using Unreal Editor for Fortnite, envisioning a partial reimagination of Mouraria, Lisbon, as a thriving, self-sustaining neighborhood no longer reliant on tourism. The project was mmissioned by Davide Onestini and André Trindade (aka By the End of May) for the 2024 Gentler Futures Festival. Special thanks to Maria Mascarenhas for providing invaluable local insights, enriching the project with contextual depth, and recommending Vale dos Vencidos, José Smith Vargas’s evocative graphic novel.

Hugo Pilate’s work revolves around enabling diverse groups to collaborate effectively by crafting shared visions, defining guiding values and principles, and developing actionable plans to bring concepts to life—from research to prototyping and piloting. His practice thrives at the intersection of design fiction, urban development, gamer culture, and maker culture, drawing inspiration from practitioners such as Sara Hendren, Nicolas Nova, Taeyoon Choi, and José Sanchez. With over a decade of experience, Hugo has honed a multidisciplinary approach that bridges speculative design with practical implementation, fostering innovation and inclusivity in collective projects. Beyond his professional endeavors, he nurtures a passion for creative coding and small-scale digital experiments. He has organized hackathons such as Digikat and Museomix India, exploring the interplay between traditional crafts and creative technologies.

LINK: Hugo Pilate

Fortnite map: Lagares do Alvará

CALL FOR PAPERS: GAME ENGINE CULTURE(S) (DEADLINE: SEPTEMBER 15 2024)

Project overview

Game engines like Unity and Unreal Engine have transcended their initial confines in video game development, evolving into versatile platforms that now influence a wide array of creative and scientific fields. These powerful tools are not just limited to gaming; they have reshaped Hollywood visual effects, virtual production, and even pre-visualisation of movie sets, as well as contemporary art and architecture. Game engines are also utilised to create training simulations for various industries, including the military. As these engines standardise aesthetic and functional practices, they simultaneously raise critical questions about artistic authorship, expressive diversity, accessibility, environmental sustainability, and the impact of increased digital consumption.

Entitled Game Engine Culture(s), this international research initiative aims to critically examine the contemporary use of game engines within the visual arts. It seeks to explore the convergence of media studies, game studies, platform studies, curatorial practice, and art history. Through in-depth analysis and prototyping under the guidance of artists and practitioners, the project investigates methods to preserve authorship and foster critique within complex digital ecosystems. Our objective is to collaborate with scholars, artists, curators, critics, and practitioners to generate new insights into the social, aesthetic, and technical dimensions of game engines.

Call for papers details

The Department of Art, Media, and Performance “Giampaolo Fabris” at IULM University, Milan, the School of Digital Arts at Manchester Metropolitan University, and the Department of Digital Humanities at King’s College London, under the guidance of Matteo Bittanti, Valentino Catricalà, and Paolo Ruffino, invite scholars, artists, developers, and practitioners to submit abstracts for a forthcoming publication and series of collaborative research activities centered around the theme of Game Engine Culture(s).

We welcome submissions that explore, but are not limited to, the following themes:

• The transformative impact of game engines on visual culture and artistic expression;
• Critical analyses of aesthetic standardization and homogeneity in production management and 'pipelines' across different fields;
• The circulation of digital assets across diverse fields of cultural production;
• Platformisation tendencies and commercial interests driving game engine development;
• The role of game engines in promoting or hindering diversity and accessibility in digital art and culture;
• Case studies on specific artists (e.g., Ed Atkins, Alice Bucknell, Ian Cheng, Jacky Connolly, Lawrence Lek, Lu Yang and many more);
• ​The use of game engines beyond gaming, including in film, architecture, and other creative industries;
• ​The accessibility of game engines for diverse populations and their role in democratizing digital art creation, including related narratives and discourses;
• The techno-ideologies and geopolitics of game engines;
• Sustainable practices and the challenge of e-waste in the context of game engine proliferation;
• Strategies for preserving artistic authorship and originality within game engine ecosystems.

Game Engine Culture(s) is fully funded by IULM University, ensuring comprehensive support throughout its development. The resulting publication, scheduled to be released in English, will be published by a leading academic publisher, guaranteeing wide dissemination and accessibility within the scholarly community. To accompany the release of the book, we are planning various events, including conferences, talks, screenings, and more.

Important dates

• Abstract submission deadline: September 15, 2024
• Notification of acceptance: October 15, 2024
• Full paper submission deadline: December 15, 2024
• Publication date: 2025

Submission guidelines

• Abstracts: Should be between 300-500 words, clearly outlining the research question, methodology, bibliography, and potential contributions to the field.
• Biographies: Please include a brief biography of the author(s) with the abstract submission.
• Full papers: Should be between 6,000-8,000 words, including references and footnotes, formatted according to MHRA style. Please use British English.
• Format: Submit your chapter as a .docx or .pdf file.
• Submission email: Send submissions to [email protected] with the subject line “Game Engine Cultures Submission”.

Contact information

For further information, please contact:

• Matteo Bittanti: [email protected]
• Paolo Ruffino: [email protected]
• Valentino Catricalà: [email protected]

This call seeks to foster innovative research trajectories both conceptually and methodologically, promoting an original and interdisciplinary approach to studying the impact of game engines on contemporary visual culture. By bringing together experts from various disciplines and creative sectors, this project not only aims to map the state of the art but also to delineate new future research directions.

We look forward to receiving your contributions and to fostering rich discussions and insights into the complex nexus of game engines and contemporary visual culture.

image: Game Engine, by Dall-E, 2024

EVENT: IT'S NOT A GAME OVER, IT'S A FINISSAGE (JUNE 22 2024, LENZBURG, SWITZERLAND)

It's not a game over, it's a finissage

Saturday June 22 at 11.00 AM

Dammweg 19

4 & 5 Etage

5600 Lenzburg

Switzerland

Join Marco De Mutiis and Matteo Bittanti on Saturday, June 22 at 11 AM to celebrate the conclusion of The Photographer's Guide to Los Santos exhibition at Photofestival Lenzburg.

But don't mistake this for another run-of-the-mill, self-congratulatory gathering fueled by endless prosecco. The curators will unveil a groundbreaking platform dedicated to in-game photography, ensuring the exhibition lives on indefinitely. Like PFAs and other forever chemicals, we're here to stay.

LINK: The Photographer's Guide to Los Santos

CFA: NOUVELLE BUG VOL. 3 (DEADLINE: JUNE 15 2024)

Il Varco and Lago Film Fest are delighted to announce the third edition of the internationally acclaimed residency, Nouvelle Bug. This unique program is dedicated to the exploration and production of cinema within the realms of video games and Artificial Intelligence. Set against the picturesque backdrop of Revine Lago, this intensive week-long experience combines webinars and live lessons designed to immerse participants in the experimental frontier of Cinema. Under the guidance of the most renowned filmmakers in this niche, attendees will not only gain invaluable insights but also actively engage in the creation of avant-garde short films. Arrive with ideas and leave with a masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of traditional filmmaking.

The workshop is designed to familiarize participants with cutting-edge techniques, supporting them through the development and production phases of their short film projects. Moreover, these projects will have the opportunity to compete for awards offered by prestigious partners such as Gargantua Distribution, Gioia Film, Sayonara Film, and Lago Film Fest.

Participants will explore new aesthetics and solutions introduced by the widespread use of artificial intelligence, learning to adopt a machine-like perspective. This approach not only opens up new vistas for storytelling but also prompts a reflection on humanity’s god-like role in software creation and its implications for our future.

Through this workshop, filmmakers will embark on a journey to discover and harness the unique narrative power of digital worlds, translating them into compelling cinematic experiences. Nouvelle Bug stands as a beacon for those eager to pioneer the fusion of technology and art, offering a platform to redefine the essence of storytelling in the digital age.

TUTORS

The tutors for the workshop include:

• Andrea Gatopoulos, a Rome-based film producer and director with a background in Modern Literature from Sapienza University, Rome. His work, which explores virtual environments, includes the project Bit-Reality and the short film Happy New Year, Jim, presented at the 54th Quinzaine des Réalisateurs in Cannes. His productions have been featured in over 100 festivals worldwide, such as Cannes, Venice, Rotterdam, and Camerimage.

• Ismaël Joffroy Chandoutis, an artist and filmmaker trained at Le Fresnoy, known for exploring the intersection of identity, technology, and the virtual world. His work Maalbeek,a deep dive into the fragmented memory of a Brussels terrorist attack victim, was selected for the 59th La Semaine de la Critique and won the 2022 César for Best Short Documentary.

• Total Refusal Crew, a pseudo-Marxist media guerrilla group focusing on the artistic intervention within mainstream video games to expose their underlying political messages. Their films have been showcased at numerous festivals, including Berlinale and Locarno, and their research has been featured in museums and art fairs globally.

• Gala Hernández López, an artist filmmaker and researcher applying a feminist and critical perspective to analyze discourses within virtual communities. Her film La Mécanique des fluides won the 2024 César for Best Documentary Short Film and the 2023 Experimental Work Award from la Scam (France), among other accolades. She regularly conducts workshops and lectures at prestigious institutions and festivals.

IMPORTANT DATES

March 28th 2024 Opening of the call for entries

June 15th 2024 Closing of the call for entries

June 28th 2024 Announcement of the 30 selected directors

August 18th 2024 Start of the workshop

October 1st 2024Selection of the winning project

Learn more

Apply

EVENT: THE LOST WOODS, AWAKENED (2024, ONLINE)

The Lost Woods, Awakened is an innovative exhibition, masterminded (and remastered) by artists Nathan Harper and Babak Ahteshamipour. This exhibition explores the tensions informing digital identity and artificial intelligence, rooted in a mythical narrative set within a digital realm borrowed from a renowned video game. This realm, aptly named The Lost Woods, Awakened, embodies a liminal, mythical space that blurs the boundaries between worlds, echoing the fluid identities of the digital objects showcased in the exhibition.

Ahteshamipour's contribution is a series of paintings, each depicting 'evil beings' that draw inspiration from ancient demonology, yet are infused with elements from contemporary culture, notably films and video games. His work aims to deconstruct mythical creatures like the Loch Ness Monster or the jackalope, exploring the layers of meaning and connections these beings have with various emotions, identities, and cultural constructs, such as the concept of 'ghosting'. In a unique blend of physical and digital artistry, Babak presents both the original paintings and their digital 3D reconstructions. These beings are not only visual spectacles but also serve as enemy NPCs in the exhibition's digital narrative, bridging the gap between cyberspace entities and tangible art.

Complementing Babak's NPCs are Harper's A.I.-generated hedgehogs. These digital creations are the result of a generative adversarial network, a type of neural network known for its role in creating the "This Person Does Not Exist" generator. Harper's hedgehogs, crafted from a dataset of Sonic the Hedgehog fan characters, represent avatars or self-inserts within the fictional universe of the exhibition. However, Harper's approach is unique in that he relinquishes human control, allowing these characters to be shaped entirely by non-human, algorithmic processes. The result is a fascinating disconnection, where the hedgehogs exist independently of human input.

The exhibition culminates in an intriguing interaction between Nathan's autonomous hedgehogs and Babak's NPCs, weaving a complex narrative that straddles the line between science fiction and mysticism. This narrative acts as a duet between human creativity and machine intelligence, questioning the boundaries of authorship and the nature of digital identity in a world increasingly influenced by artificial intelligence. The Lost Woods, Awakened is not just an art exhibition; it is a thought-provoking exploration of the interplay between the tangible and the virtual, the ancient and the modern, and the human and the machine.

LINK: The Lost Woods, Awakened

LINK: Nathan Harper

LINK: Babak Ahteshamipour

EVENT: VIRTUAL TEXTUAL (OCTOBER 6 - DECEMBER 17 2023, LEICESTER, UK)

 

Virtual Textual

6th October – 17th December 2023

Phoenix Cinema and Art Centre
4 Midland Street
Leicester
LE1 1TG

press release

The exhibition Virtual Textual, explores the digital aspects of game-based poetry, bringing together artists from across the globe in an exhibition that champions innovative, but also careful uses of technology. All the pieces in the exhibition employ lower impact technology – low draw graphics, limited palettes, local-only connections – and easily accessible interfaces across a collection of ludic digital poetic works.

The works in Virtual Textualconsider the ways in which the reader is an essential part in how a text exists in space, and how that text can shift, becoming entirely new with each instance that it is encountered. Participants will discover that reading is no longer a passive act but a dynamic and immersive experience.

At the heart of the exhibition is the Playing Poetry and Phoenix co-commissioned work Wood Wide Web, a lo-fi cottage-commodore-core poetic walking simulator that senses its surroundings. Audiences can become co-creators in an ever-growing piece of poetic nature writing that alters itself depending on the happiness of the plants around it.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a programme of workshops from visiting and local artists, opportunities for audiences to make their own games, and a published pamphlet delving into the exhibition and collecting new game-based works that readers can explore beyond the space.

The Playing Poetry team has emerged from many years in poetry publishing, producing live literature, and developing experimental games, with exhibitions at Somerset House, and commissions from The National Poetry Library, The Edwin Morgan Society, and Edgelandia. Led by Nick Murray, Playing Poetry has launched with Poetry Games, a poignant exhibition in partnership with the National Poetry Library in the Southbank Centre and a game poetry course with the Poetry School.

Check out the amazing projects on display

LINK: Virtual Textual

LINK: Playing Poetry

EVENT: GAMEZ & RULEZ #8 (OCTOBER 20-21, ZÜRICH, SWITZERLAND)

gameZ & ruleZ #8

October 20-21, 2022

ToniAreal, 5th Floor, Room 5.K12

Zürcher Hochschule der Künste (ZHdK)
Departement Design
Fachrichtung Game Design
Toni-Areal, Pfingstweidstrasse 96
Postfach, CH-8031 Zürich, Switzerland

Get ready for the 8th edition of one of the coolest game and culture festivals in Europe, gameZ & ruleZ, which takes place annually in Zürich, Switzerland and is organized by Mela Kocher from the Master's Program in Game Design and managed by GameLab's coordinators Beat Suter and René Bauer. This year's topic is Mechanics of Play. The event will be live streamed. 

Description:

Play seems to be a free form, it is self-contained and people do it to get satisfaction. It also helps us to communicate and understand what surrounds us. It is best understood in correlation to normal life or work. Work favours pain and play favours pleasure. Work has to be done to increase productivity, play does not have to be productive, it is not constricted, may be spontaneous, aimless and creative at the same time. And you may even learn something by playing.

The conference looks at moments of play, different aspects of play and playful approaches in games, art and culture. What does free play mean in comparison to play a game with set rules? What happens, if we start changing some of the set rules? And what happens if we constrict free play with boundaries and some rules? If play is like a language, there must be some elements of play that we use in different kinds of playing.

With our guests we are discussing these elements and their connections as mechanics of play. Jörg Piringer plays with language and code. Matteo Bittanti delves into politics and ideology of playing video games. Sonia Fizek looks at playing at a distance and Nathalie Lawhead makes us familiar with humor in playing with software. And there is more, we are pleased to welcome ten guest speakers at the gameZ & ruleZ 2022.

Schedule

Program*: Thursday, 20. October, Room 5.K12

13.00	Opening
13.30	Matteo Bittanti (gamescenes.org, US): The Politics of Play / Playful Politics (Abstract & Bio)
14.30	Sjors Righters (studio rigters, NL): Concepts of the virtual sandbox and how to change them  (Abstract & Bio)
15.30	BREAK & Coffee
16.00	Jörg Piringer (AT): text=code=play (Abstract & Bio)
17.00	Daniel Hackbarth (D/CH): Gamification of Politics
18.00	Guido Berger (ZHCH): Playing Farming Simulator (CH)

Program*: Friday, 21. October, Room 5.K12

13.00	Opening
13.15	Sonia Fizek (Cologne Gamelab, D) : Playing at a Distance
14.15	Max Moswitzer (Artist, Experimental Gameculture AW Wien): Avatar at Play
15.15	Experiments in Action: Sebastian Burckhardt (CH): Kloppyssimo (Abstract & Bio)
15.40	Experiments in Action:  Kathleen Bohren CH): (Abstratd & Bio)
16.00	BREAK & Coffee
16.30	Nathalie Lawhead (US): When Software makes you laugh

LINK: Mechanics of Play

EVENT: GINA HARA (SEPTEMBER 2 - 15 2022, ONLINE)

VALLEY

digital video/machinima (1280 x 720), color, sound, 7’ 06”, Hungary/Canada

Created by Gina Hara

vral.org

 

Inspired by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) software in mental health contexts, Gina Hara uses the world of Minecraft as a backdrop for a series of exchanges with an AI-powered chatbot, called Robin, developed specifically for the project. Both the process and the resulting narrative are documented in this short machinima.

Gina Hara is a Hungarian-Canadian filmmaker and artist. She holds an MA in Intermedia, an MFA in Film Production and worked with film, video, new media, gaming, and design. Waning (2011), her first fiction film, was nominated for a Best Canadian Short award at the Toronto International Film Festival. Your Place or Minecraft (2016), a machinima web series focusing on game studies, is currently available on YouTube. Hara’s full length documentary Geek Girls (2017) explores the notion of subculture from women’s perspective and was screened internationally, including IULM University in 2018 during an event entitled Gender Play. Her artworks have been exhibited by several institutions including the New Museum in New York, the Budapest Kunsthalle and the City of Montreal. Hara lives in Montreal, where she works as Creative Director of the Technoculture, Art and Games Research Centre.

 

WATCH NOW

EVENT: OASIS: THE VIDEOGAME EXHIBITION (JUNE 15 - JUNE 2022, MADRID, SPAIN AND ONLINE)

Oasis. The videogame exhibition 

 

Curated by María Luján Oulton – David Alonso – Sergio Reyes

 

ESNE University in Madrid, Spain

 

97, Avenida de Alfonso XIII, in Distrito de Chamartín

June 15 - June 20 2022

The exhibition showcases 24 international games grouped into 4 nodes. It is accompanied by a program of round tables (Friday the 17th), a Makey Makey workshop (Saturday the 18th), a cicle of documentaries (Sunday the 19th) and a reading space which aims to give an intro to the local scene of gamestudies in Spain.

As curator María Luján Oulton writes:

I also wanted to invite you to listen to the round tables that will be taking place tomorrow Friday 17th and will be live streamed via youtube The sessions will be in English with local and international speakers. The topics will be: Museum & Videogames, Affect & play, Artgames curators and festivals, Videogames, activism and politics, Postmortem clinic. 

Click here to read the curatorial text in Spanish and English

LINK: OASIS