Digital Play: Reloaded
dal 17/3/2005 al 30/5/2005
Segnalato da
17/3/2005
Digital Play: Reloaded
Museum of the Moving Image, Astoria
An Exhibition of Video Games and Game-Based Art. The show opens with appearances and a performance by the makers of Pac-Mondrian, a video 'artcade' game created by the Toronto-based art collective Prize Budget for Boys. All of the games and installations can be played by visitors.
An Exhibition of Video Games and Game-Based Art
PAC-MONDRIAN devours Museum of the Moving Image in expanded exhibition of video games and game-based art March 18 – May 30, 2005
From March 18 through May 30, 2005, the Museum of the Moving Image welcomes Pac-Mondrian and nine other irreverent and innovative digital games to an upgraded, expanded version of Digital Play, the Museum’s interactive exhibition of video games and game-based art.
Digital Play: Reloaded opens on Friday, March 18, 2005, with appearances and a 7 p.m. performance by the makers of Pac-Mondrian, a video “artcade†game created by the Toronto-based art collective Prize Budget for Boys. The exhibition will be shown in the Museum’s William Fox Gallery, where all of the games and installations can be played by visitors. After the March 18 opening, the exhibition will be open to the public on weekends from March 19 – May 30, 2005.
Pac-Mondrian is an irreverent fusion of video games and fine art, as Toru Iwatani’s iconic yellow sphere munches his way through Piet Mondrian's modernist artwork Broadway Boogie Woogie. This will be the first and only showing of Pac-Mondrian in the United States. “Celebrating his 25th birthday this year, Pac-Man still has an enduring hold on the public imagination, as is evidenced by both authorized and, in this case, unauthorized uses of and references to the character in entertainment media,†says Carl Goodman, the Museum’s Deputy Director and Director of Digital Media. Pac-Mondrian will be shown alongside the original arcade game Ms. Pac-Man (1981).
Other new installations in Digital Play: Reloaded include Arcadia (2004), an arcade-style PC game from the independent game studio Gamelab, which challenges audiences to play four arcade-style video games at one time; the absurd and engaging Japanese game Katamari Damacy which, roughly translated, means “soul of clump,†and refers to a rolling ball of detritus controlled by the player; and Stepmania, an independently created, open-source version of the arcade dance game phenomenon, Dance Dance Revolution. Unlike its commercial counterpart, Stepmania incorporates audiences’ music collections and dance patterns, which are shared online.
Also featured in Digital Play: Reloaded are pairings of classic arcade games with their contemporary counterparts: Shigeru Miyamoto’s original Donkey Kong (1981) arcade game is paired with Donkey Konga (2004), which uses a set of bongos as its interface. Pole Position (1982) and Burnout 3: Takedown (2004) illustrate how driving games have evolved in the last two decades. The innovative arcade sports game NBA Jam (1993) is shown with the arcade-style NBA Street (2005).
Digital Play: Reloaded spills out into the Museum’s lobby with the installation Maiden Flight (2004), a sculptural video artwork by Paul Johnson, in which two game scenarios – one depicting an outer space battle and another depicting a man eating, exercising, and watching television – effect each other in surprising ways.
The addition of video game-based art adds a new, provocative twist to the Museum’s existing Digital Play exhibition, which is organized around the theme of action in its different uses and interpretations. Music-, dance-, and movement-oriented video games originating in Japan constitute a shift from traditional, often violent game scenarios. Classic arcade games from the 1980s are paired with current home-based games to contrast their approaches to such action-related topics as driving and waging battle on land and in space. Though the graphics have changed significantly, patterns of play remain similar.
Goodman says, “This upgraded installment of Digital Play illustrates how ‘arcade’ no longer denotes a place as much as it describes a sensibility. Arcade-style games – short in duration, easy to learn and play, intense, and mildly addictive – are as prominent as ever, even if arcades as a place of play no longer lead the way.â€
Opening reception with artists Prize Budget for Boys on March 18, 6:30-8:30pm, performance at 7pm
Museum Admission: $10.00 for adults; $7.50 for persons over 65 and for students with ID; $5.00 for children ages 5-18. Children under 5 and Museum members are admitted free. Admission to the galleries is free on Fridays, 4:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Museum of the Moving Image
35 Avenue at 36 Street, Astoria, NY 11106
Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Hours: Wednesday & Thursday, 12:00 to 5:00 p.m. Friday, 12:00 to 8:00 p.m. Saturday & Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. (Tuesday, school groups only, by appointment)