Impressions

Art in the digital world is viewed many ways, and created in many forms. It can be used to be incorporated into society and have an actual application, as well as the idea that it can bring knowledge and power to society about subjects that are not well known. A couple artists that focus on many of these things are Aaron Oldenburg, and Jamie Allen. Aaron Oldenburg is a game designer and new media artist whose primary interest is in game rules as an expressive medium. His video and interactive work has exhibited in festivals and galleries in New York, Berlin, São Paulo and Los Angeles, including SIGGRAPH and FILE Electronic Language International Festival. He teaches game design as an Assistant Professor in University of Baltimore's Simulation and Digital Entertainment program and has an MFA from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. In October 2003 he finished two years as an HIV Health Extension Agent for the Peace Corps in Mali, West Africa. Jamie Allen describes himself as someone who builds things with his head and hands, creating things that involve our relationships to creativity, technology and resources. He is Head of Research at the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design, where he helps chart a course for research and experimentation at the institute, with colleagues in the Research team and Labs.ciid.dk.  

Each of these artists create art that provokes the audience to really think about what the art is saying, and how it effects their lives personally. A piece that Aaron Oldenburg created, called “After.” He describes this artwork as “[…] A video game about finding and then placing a loved one in the afterlife. The goal is to simulate an agnostic encounter with one's own belief system when dealing with death. The game begins with the death of a partner, and after, the player encounters obstacles in their life that can be overcome only by incorporating the imagined presence of their departed lover into their life. The controls are traditional first person mouse and keyboard.” After experiencing this game, the emotions that were created from this were intense. You witness your loved one dying, and then you have to go through trials and many an error to find them and guide them to the afterlife. The graphic style in this game are minimal, and in this sense, it is truly effective, because you are focused on making sure that your loved one makes it to the end where they will be comfortable.

At the start of the game, you cannot really interact with many things other than laying down and standing back up as you watch a red timer slowly go down, a timer to the inevitable death of the loved one that you are controlling. This causes a tension and anxiety in the person playing the game, because they know it is coming. Once it happens, the feeling is paralleled to the feeling of losing someone in real life, because while it may be expected, it does not help in the end, you still feel strange and not ready for it, and through the journey of getting them there, it is difficult, but once they are able to get to the other side, there is solitude, which is a comforting feeling. However, unsure that this is intentional, after the game ends, it completely starts over. This personally was a very empty feeling. It was over, but suddenly nothing felt accomplished. Again, the emotions from this game were an incredible array of feelings, and did cause me to think about my own life, and death that I have encountered.

For the piece that Jamie Allen did, he created a movement called “Human Potential” which focused on the idea of sustainability. Siggraph Asia describes this work as “a bicycle generator powers a water pump and lighting system for a plantation of hydroponically grown, edible plants. The plants provide nourishment for the biker, and this sealed micro-ecosystem asks: What are the limits of human ‘sustainability’?” He used technology to help make the bike sustain the crops that were growing, causing a cycle for the crops and the human. This provokes many questions about how we are living and the idea that perhaps we could sustain our own crops to live, but since we are in such an industrialized society now, it is nearly impossible to sustain ourselves this way by merely focusing on the product. Too much energy has to go into the crops, and time that it is not a viable way of living.

With this idea, though, it gives the audience ideas about how they can possibly change the way they live to help the environment, without using all of their energy to do so. This personally is really effective, because the relationship between the art and the social and political concept of growing your own food, or buying selectively. Both of these pieces cause many thoughts for the audience, and cause them to reflect on their life, causing an impression in the audience lives. However, while “After” causes an incredible amount of emotion, “Human Potential” just causes many questions to arise. And obviously the style of both of these projects are incredibly different, one is a video game while the other involves reality and immersion into community issues.

As for some critique for both of these projects, in Aaron Oldenburg’s “After,” it would have been more effective if perhaps during the time lapse to the loved ones death, if there were more human interactions with the surroundings to display more of a human sense. The controls are easy to understand, and the feelings are honestly the thing that matters most, and it was extremely effective personally. The presentation was executed very well, and was very easily downloadable. This project was an incredible success. For “Human Potential” I feel like for it to be more successful, there could have been more research and information about what it takes to sustain the crops that we need to live. Perhaps some numbers about how much energy would be needed to sustain those crops with the setup they had. The idea was very interesting and very impressionable, and the presentation was set up in colorful and very modern way which in turn was also successful. 

Both of these artists created an impression in my life and how I look at things. Also, I attempted to contact both of these artists a few times over the semester; however, neither of them responded or were able to respond, most likely due to the volume of work they are currently doing.

Citations

Allen, Jamie. "Human Potential (Movement) | Jamie Allen." Jamie Allen Human Potential Movement Comments. Siggraph, n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.

"Art Gallery: Adaptation For Attendees SIGGRAPH Asia 2009." Art Gallery: Adaptation For Attendees SIGGRAPH Asia 2009. Eurographics, n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.

Oldenburg, Aaron. "Aaron Oldenburg." ...Games. Unity & MakeHuman, n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.

Oldenburg, Aaron. "Rhizome | After." Rhizome | After. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.