art – we respond together

Games in Art – Art in Games

December 7, 2020

Game: “A game is a structured form of play, usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool.Games are distinct from work, which is usually carried out for remuneration, and from art, which is more often an expression of aesthetic or ideological elements(…). Key components of games are goals, rules, challenge, and interaction.”

Art: “Art is a diverse range of human activities involving the creation of visual, auditory or performing artifacts (artworks), which express the creator’s imagination, conceptual ideas, or technical skill, intended to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.”

—

Many artists base their work on the intent of involving the viewer, or the subject, in certain ways. Artists look for evoking feelings or emotions in a certain way. However, most traditional media fail to involve users completely. Even though the work of more progressive artists such as James Turrell or Olafur Eliasson play with viewer’s perception and aim to interact with them in a more active, immersive way, they are still passive installations just meant to be contemplated.

Games, on the other hand, need the interactive component to exist in the first place. Without a person actively interacting with it, there is nothing. They owe their very existence to the spectator who interacts with them and thus, they become the perfect tool for artists to gain their viewers’ active participation. This opens the door for more effective ways to communicate with the spectator and evoke emotions through art.

Even though there are some niche artists exploring these paths now, I believe that as digital literacy becomes more accessible through new and more user-friendly tools and programming languages, we will start to see games thriving as a new, more widely accepted media for art.

Flappy Bird in a museum

December 5, 2020

I started off on Wikipedia’s “List of video games considered artistic”, a curated list based on game designers and art critics, which was already a weird place to be. Who gets to definitely decide what is ‘artistic’ or not? As I was scrolling through the list, one game in particular caught my eye: Flappy Bird. I remember how the game became instantly famous overnight. Everyone and their mother was addicted to the incredibly simplistic game, to the point where the creator eventually had it taken off the app store. But despite its success, should it really be considered art? According to Wikipedia, the “arcade-style mobile game [is] now present in both the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Museum of Modern Art.” This raised another series of questions because I’ve been grappling with the idea of video games as art for a while now. While I do agree that game designers are artists, is it the type of art that can be imagined in galleries and prestigious museums? I tried to look further into whether it had been exhibited, etc., but I couldn’t find too much more on the subject. But who knows- as digital media and entertainment becomes more popular, maybe we’ll start seeing pop culture start to mesh with the world of fine art.

Certamente Tableware, Konstantin Grcic

September 24, 2020

Grcic’s salad server set is an investigation into lines and planes. Being made with only one continuous piece of thin metal wire, this salad server features a minimalist tone with decorative elements created from the curves and pointed edges the line is bent in. The functionality of the salad server is still kept intact while the tool itself uses less material than say a traditional serving spoon. This salad server is part of an entire set of tableware called Passami il sale, meaning “pass the salt”. The set was created with the skills from local craftsmen from the north of Brescia in northern Italy. With such a simple yet complex design, Grcic has created tableware made to be appreciated but also to be used effectively.

Marley Soden: Typography and Design in Food

September 12, 2020

A recent artist I discovered during quarantine who inspires my artwork is Marley Soden (who goes by “Marley Makes Things” on social media). I’ve always been really interested in typography and calligraphy, and Marley is constantly pushing the boundaries with writing styles, mediums, and surfaces. She’s designed a variety of things from large-scale murals to book covers. Something I found very moving was her story about her struggles with eating disorders and her relationships with food, but how she found comfort and recovery by fostering a newfound love of cooking and incorporating it into her art. A lot of her recent designs are made with food items which she bakes herself (like words made out of sprinkles or flour). Her attention to detail- from the initial design, to the construction, to the digital editing- is incredibly inspiring!

Upcoming exhibition at FWM – Samara Golden

August 28, 2020

I’ve been working at The Fabric Workshop and Museum (FWM) for the past 3 years. In that time, I’ve had the opportunity to work with a bunch of incredible artists (like Suzanne Bocanegra, Sonya Clark, Joy Feasley, Paul Swenbeck and Jacolby Satterwhite, to name a few). Here’s how it works: FWM invites an artist to collaborate with the institution in the creation of an exhibition of that artist’s work. Over the course of about 2 years, we experiment with materials and processes with the artist and, ultimately, create finished works for a gallery show. In the beginning of the process, we invite the artist to dream big. What have you always wanted to make but haven’t had the resources or time? Then we make the work. Sometimes we make it ourselves with the sewing machines, 3D printers, silk screens and other tools we have at FWM. Sometimes we outsource the work to fabrication shops in the area. It’s pretty magical being an observer and participant in another artist’s process from idea to exhibition. I will share a bunch of stories and details about FWM projects and artists over the course of the semester! The photograph attached to this post is of Samara Golden‘s near-complete installation. It opens to the public on September 10, 2020. That’s an FWM employee carefully walking on and cleaning the mirrors in the installation. With Samara, we made a bunch of half-scale objects and glued/screwed them to the ceiling so that when you look at the mirrors on the floor, you think you’re looking down into some beach scene with trash-covered dunes and a boardwalk. The show is called Upstairs at Steve’s. What else can you find out about Samara’s work on the internet? Post a reply