ART + GAMES WORLD TOUR, by Isabelle Arvers, 2019 – 2020

• In ART AND GAMES WORLD TOUR, UNCA­TE­GO­RI­ZED

French version

To cele­brate her 20 years as cura­tor in the fields of art and video games, Isabe­lle Arvers propo­ses to carry out in 2019 a world tour of art and video games in order to meet digi­tal artists and inde­pen­dent deve­lo­pers in more than 15 coun­tries of the world.

“Her design: to engage from June 2019 to March 2020 in a tour of the world to meet artists, actors and deve­lo­pers of video games outside the Ameri­can and Euro­pean beaten paths to build a project on the diver­sity of video game And high­light the women in the sector. Acti­vist of an art that is eman­ci­pa­ted from the inter­na­ti­o­nal majors of the genre, Isabe­lle Arvers advo­ca­tes for inde­pen­dence, for forms of expe­ri­men­tal art that help “out of the unique vision”.

Sébas­tien Acker, La Nouve­lle Répu­bli­que, 18.01.2019

If Western coun­tries have recently reali­zed the need to promote gender, sexu­a­lity and race diver­sity in video games with the orga­ni­za­tion of events such as GaymerX or Rain­bow Arcade, to name a few, what about the rest of the world?

ART+­GA­MES WORLD­TOUR aims not only to disco­ver new talents and diffe­rent ways of dealing with the issue of diver­sity, but it also propo­ses to create connec­ti­ons and to initi­ate colla­bo­ra­ti­ons with the worlds of game art, inde­pen­dent games, games DIY art in Asia, India, the Middle East, Latin America and Africa. The purpose is to meet the actors of this field of artis­tic explo­ra­tion, to take the time to share the working methods and the ways to conceive the world, to exchange and share in order to deve­lop a totally new concept of the “working toget­her”. More­o­ver the whole project is based into brin­ging as much as possi­ble into the spot­lights the female, queer and deco­lo­nial prac­ti­ces and works.

Down­load the complete presen­ta­tion brochure of ArtGa­mes­World­Tour

Evolu­tion of gaming, a retro­ga­ming exhi­bit cura­ted by Isabe­lle Arvers in Vancou­ver, 2014

THE GENE­SIS OF THE PROJECT

In 2017, Isabe­lle Arvers spends 15 days in New York. She meets many artists as well as profes­si­o­nals in the art and video games field, visits works­hops, and tours exhi­bits. She reports on this enri­ching and immer­sive expe­ri­ence in her arti­cle on the New York art and video game scene in novem­ber 2017.

A few months later, in August 2018, she is welco­med in resi­dence in Plato­he­dro in Mede­llin and spends three weeks giving machi­nima works­hops to commu­ni­ties close to Plato­he­dro and LGBTI Mesa Diversa Comuna 4. At the same time, she presen­ted lectu­res on art and video games in three univer­si­ties and art scho­ols (MIT, EAFIT, Univer­sita de Anthi­o­quia).

Machi­nima works­hop on iden­tity and gender, Comuna Quatro

In this context, she meets many artists working on video, the hacking of tech­no­lo­gies and free soft­ware as well as inde­pen­dent game deve­lo­pers and virtual reality rese­arch labs. Stun­ned by the crea­tive abun­dance she obser­ves, she deci­des to orga­nize a special edition of Art Games Demos on site.

Art Games Demos, Plato­he­dro, Mede­llin, 2018

Imagi­ned by Isabe­lle Arvers and Chloé Desmoi­ne­aux, Art Games Demos is a festive event dedi­ca­ted to the exhi­bi­tion of crea­ti­ons touching near and far to video art and video games.

The works presen­ted during this evening can come from emer­ging or confir­med artists, local or inter­na­ti­o­nal, with video projec­ti­ons, demons­tra­ti­ons of inde­pen­dent, expe­ri­men­tal or artis­tic video games as well as perfor­man­ces, lives, chip­tu­nes music concerts and DJ Sets.

Queer and femi­nist Art Games Demos, Equi­ta­ble Café, Marsei­lle, 2017

This groun­ding expe­ri­ence focu­sed on high­ligh­ting the issues of diver­sity, gender and deco­lo­ni­za­tion, while analy­zing the working and exchange methods of the diffe­rent commu­ni­ties in order to high­light their inno­va­tive and inspi­ring nature. It thus gives impe­tus to imagine an even more inclu­sive, trans­ver­sal and ambi­ti­ous project:

Machi­nima works­hop, Fayoum Art Center, Egypt, 2014

THE PROJECT

For ten months, Isabe­lle Arvers will travel the world and stay between two to three weeks in each of the selec­ted coun­tries. She will meet the commu­ni­ties of artists and inde­pen­dent deve­lo­pers, most of them unknown in Europe or the United States, making it so possi­ble to make an exten­sive inven­tory of the state of the art projects in the world of the game, the hack, and all forms of digi­tal acti­vist art.

These meetings are also an oppor­tu­nity to exchange and share about the raised issues throug­hout speci­fi­cally desig­ned for this purpose works­hops and confe­ren­ces in univer­si­ties and scho­ols of art and video games. The trip will also offer the oppor­tu­nity to attend the vari­ous speci­a­li­zed events and to visit the centers of crea­tion [places of demons­tra­tion of digi­tal art and video games, univer­si­ties and scho­ols of art and video games, art and new media centers, hack­labs, fablabs, indie meetups, game­jams] and to expand the network by strengt­he­ning links across borders.

To achi­eve this, Isabe­lle Arvers relies on the multi­pli­city and vari­ety of networks she has gathe­red around her in 20 years of active and inten­sive prac­tice: femi­nists, cyber­fe­mi­nists, queer, inde­pen­dent games, game art, tech­no­logy diver­sion, hackers­pa­ces, DIY tech­no­lo­gies, student in art and video games, compu­ter deve­lop­ment etc.

Game art and machi­nima works­hop and exhi­bit in Rurals­ca­pes, San José de Barrero, Brasil, 2015

THE GOALS

The goals are multi­ple:

• disco­ver inno­va­tive projects still unknown in Europe and the United States;
• report on the state of the art in video games and contem­po­rary art;
• broa­den the know­ledge of a form of artis­tic expres­sion that is wides­pread as a prac­tice but still confi­den­tial when it comes to diffu­sion in the art market;
• high­light the current effer­ves­cency of these areas and the rich­ness of their possi­ble cros­sings off the beaten tracks and networks alre­ady perfectly iden­ti­fied in a trans­ver­sal appro­ach that can
• inspire other art forms as to the adop­tion of collec­tive and inno­va­tive methods of crea­tion and promo­tion;
• promote inno­va­tive and inspi­ring modes of colla­bo­ra­tion, new ways of doing things that can point the way to new ways of rela­ting to others, work and the virtual world;
• connect video game artists and deve­lo­pers around the world;
• promote the deve­lop­ment of cross-ferti­li­za­tion between Western Euro­pean networks and those in Latin America, Africa and Asia;
• show­case women, femi­nist, queer and deco­lo­ni­zed art works through the promo­tion of diver­sity in the crea­tion of video games and digi­tal art;
• docu­men­ting for the future this histo­ric moment in the deve­lop­ment of digi­tal prac­ti­ces and return it to enrich the docu­men­ta­tion of a history of art being writ­ten.

THE OUTPUTS

Seve­ral moments and types of resti­tu­tion are plan­ned allo­wing a valo­ri­za­tion all throug­hout the project of the spon­sors, patrons, finan­ci­ers of all hori­zons that support the project.

Beside the gender and deco­lo­nial aspects, a speci­fic empha­sis will be placed on parti­ci­pa­tory works and projects: physi­cal games, urban games, expe­ri­men­tal and artis­tic games, inter­ac­tive shows, works­hops, perfor­man­ces, inter­ac­tive insta­lla­ti­ons, games in VR, etc.

MONTHLY ONLINE PUBLI­CA­TI­ONS

Throug­hout the trip, each visit will result in a report inclu­ding portraits of artists, game desig­ners and deve­lo­pers, as well as revi­ews of exhi­bi­ti­ons or events. Each month, Isabe­lle Arvers will publish a video / writing arti­cle of all her meetings, in part­ners­hip with a media.

THE ESSAY IN THE FORM OF AN ARTBOOK

These reports, enri­ched with all the collec­ted docu­men­ta­tion [photo­graphs, recor­dings, videos, memo­ra­bi­lia, arti­cles, texts, deri­ved products etc], will cons­ti­tute the basic mate­rial for writing and desig­ning an essay on the current video and game art. It will come in the form of an art book.

This paper art edition aims to portray the crea­tors and crea­ti­ves encoun­te­red and to offer a criti­cal look at the “art and video games” produc­tion today in the world. Desig­ned throug­hout the trip, struc­tu­red around the publis­hed reports online, it propo­ses a more compre­hen­sive version of the texts matu­red on this occa­sion and will serve as a basis for the deve­lop­ment of the exhi­bi­tion cata­log.

TWO DAYS FESTI­VAL

To cele­brate the long jour­ney and give a first oppor­tu­nity to disco­ver the selec­ted works, a festive art and video game event in the form of a two-day festi­val will be orga­ni­zed. Will be on the menu perfor­man­ces, disco­very of games, inter­net links with authors around the world, video projec­ti­ons, DJ sets etc.

THE NOMA­DIC INTER­NA­TI­O­NAL EXHI­BI­TION ART AND VIDEO GAMES

The selec­tion of works and artists coming from all over the world will be presen­ted to a wider Euro­pean audi­ence during an itine­rant inter­na­ti­o­nal exhi­bi­tion “art and vide­o­ga­mes”.

THE EXHI­BI­TI­ON’S CATA­LOG

The exhi­bi­tion cata­log will again enrich the essay of new and speci­fic mate­ri­als speci­ally concei­ved for the trave­ling exhi­bi­tion.

Isabe­lle Arvers, testing VR games in Colom­bia

THE DESTI­NA­TI­ONS

Asia

South Korea

Taiwan

Japan

Thai­land

Indo­ne­sia

Africa

Nige­ria

Sene­gal

Ivory Coast

South America

Brazil

Argen­tina

Mexico

Colom­bia

India

Middel East

Israël/Pales­tine

Leba­non

Egypt

CONTACT

Isabe­lle Arvers – iarversgmail [ punto ] com (iarvers[at]gmail[dot]com) +33661998386

www.isabe­lle­ar­vers.com – www.kare­ron.com

Anna­ka­rin Quinto – contactnousa­vons­tan­ta­par­ta­ger [ punto ] com (contact[at]nousa­vons­tan­ta­par­ta­ger[dot]com) +33661415662

www.nousa­vons­tan­ta­par­ta­ger.com