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Upcoming video game exhibit at Phoenix Art Museum to inspire debate, extend conversation

Super Mario World, 1991, Hiroshi Yamauchi, executive producer; Shigeru Miyamoto, producer; Takashi Tezuka, lead director, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo of America, Inc.
Super Mario World, 1991, Hiroshi Yamauchi, executive producer; Shigeru Miyamoto, producer; Takashi Tezuka, lead director, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo of America, Inc.

A Screenshot from the classic game "Super Mario World." "The Art of Video Games" is scheduled to run from June 16 to Sept. 29 in the Steele Gallery at the Phoenix Art Museum. (photo courtesy of The Phoenix Art Museum) A Screenshot from the classic game "Super Mario World." "The Art of Video Games" is scheduled to run from June 16 to Sept. 29 in the Steele Gallery at the Phoenix Art Museum. (photo courtesy of The Phoenix Art Museum)

The late legendary film critic Roger Ebert once enraged all of geekdom by stating that, by design, video games were unable to be considered as art.

In the upcoming months, an exhibition on loan from the Smithsonian presents a counterargument to Ebert's musing that “no video gamer now living will survive long enough to experience the medium as an art form.

Soon, however, the Phoenix Art Museum joins Washington, D.C., Boca Rotan, Florida, and Seattle as one of several cities moving counter to this beholden belief.

Increasingly, video games have become more and more a distinguished medium in their own right. Not only do they incorporate the aesthetic, they also include soundboards and narration, and they sometimes eclipse their cinematic counterparts, museum curator Christian Adame said.

The upcoming exhibit, called “The Art of Video Games,” traces the history of the medium from early arcade entertainment of “Pac-Man” to the recent abstraction of “Flower,” where gameplay consists of the player inhabiting the wind, pushing leaves from one side of the screen to the other.

On display just as prominently is various conceptual artwork of the digital characters and landscapes envisioned by the artists for the games, bridging the connective tissue between mindless entertainment and the artisan side of things.

“We hope they’ll draw the connections between visual and video game artist and how they’ve communicated and responded to each other,” Adame said.

In the transition from “Order, Chaos, and the Space Between,” which ended May 5 after months on display in the Steele Gallery, the exhibit reveals how interactive it will be with patrons than the usual gallery.

“Looking at art is very interactive on it’s own terms, but this interaction is very different, because you’re actually able to touch controllers from the original consoles and buttons of the videos playing,” Adame said. “The tech is definitely an element that sets the show apart."

Differing from the many shows in the past, the imposed physical detachment from the art is noticeably absent from the Smithsonian galley; displays not unlike the ones at the Arizona Science Center.

It was a move that the museum staff was conscious of in the collection’s acquisition after visiting the site of the exhibition at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.

“We’re in the field of what shows are attractive to us that would compliment our collection or extend the conversation in a different direction,” Adame said.

Similar to a visual aid at the science center, when patrons will enter the galley, they’ll see the faces of several gamers playing games projected on the wall.

For the art museum, the move toward youthful exhibitions is one of several tactics to attract new visitors, in lieu of the museum being located in the blossoming downtown cultural hub and, most importantly, situated along the light rail.

“It’s definitely spread out across all ages at the museum, and that’s nice for us to hear as educators,” Adame said.

"The Art of Video Games" is scheduled to run from June 16 to Sept. 29 in the Steele Gallery at the Phoenix Art Museum.

 

Reach the reporter at tccoste1@asu.edu


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