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OPEN ENDED STORIES
a lecture by
Total Refusal
OPEN ENDED STORIES
The rendered spheres of video games are an attempt to recreate fantasies of our world as superlatives. However, these interactive moving image excesses usually end at some point, becoming fragile at their borders. Wallpapers with painted skylines, mountains or oceans are mounted to their edges. These fascinating Open Worlds, which seem to extend into infinity, are amazingly modeled on the physical-real counterpart and even exceed it - a pastiche of the Earth, that is, an imitation that imitates and alienates its template. Other games never end, stretching into infinity with the help of procedurally generated galaxies. Sometimes the hinterland beyond the frontier territory becomes subject to other, extra-terrestrial laws, stones float in the air or sunken islands of past times suddenly appear. The end of the world as such, however, finds its preferred stage in video games: the apocalypse becomes one of the most frequently used narratives.
The limits of games' representability, however, lie in its economic logic. Structurally conservative, the media industry stands still under the weight of best practice models and therefore stuck in a loop of sequels, unable to break new ground.
The rendered spheres of video games are an attempt to recreate fantasies of our world as superlatives. However, these interactive moving image excesses usually end at some point, becoming fragile at their borders. Wallpapers with painted skylines, mountains or oceans are mounted to their edges. These fascinating Open Worlds, which seem to extend into infinity, are amazingly modeled on the physical-real counterpart and even exceed it - a pastiche of the Earth, that is, an imitation that imitates and alienates its template. Other games never end, stretching into infinity with the help of procedurally generated galaxies. Sometimes the hinterland beyond the frontier territory becomes subject to other, extra-terrestrial laws, stones float in the air or sunken islands of past times suddenly appear. The end of the world as such, however, finds its preferred stage in video games: the apocalypse becomes one of the most frequently used narratives.
The limits of games' representability, however, lie in its economic logic. Structurally conservative, the media industry stands still under the weight of best practice models and therefore stuck in a loop of sequels, unable to break new ground.
03.03.2023 7pm
at MAGAZIN
Space for Contemporary Architecture
Weyringergasse 27i, 1040 Vienna
Total Refusal
The pseudo-Marxist media guerrilla Total Refusal explores and practices strategies for artistic intervention in contemporary computer games. It works with tools of appropriation and rededication of game resources. Their films and performances have been presented at the Berlinale '20 and MoMA in NYC, among others, and they received the award for best Austrian short documentary (Diagonale'20, Graz). Currently Total Refusal consists of Susanna Flock, Adrian Jonas Haim, Jona Kleinlein, Robin Klengel, Leonhard Müllner, Michael Stumpf.
https://totalrefusal.com/
The pseudo-Marxist media guerrilla Total Refusal explores and practices strategies for artistic intervention in contemporary computer games. It works with tools of appropriation and rededication of game resources. Their films and performances have been presented at the Berlinale '20 and MoMA in NYC, among others, and they received the award for best Austrian short documentary (Diagonale'20, Graz). Currently Total Refusal consists of Susanna Flock, Adrian Jonas Haim, Jona Kleinlein, Robin Klengel, Leonhard Müllner, Michael Stumpf.
https://totalrefusal.com/
All photos by: © Richard Pobaschnig