Blips: New York's Finest

Source: The NYU MFA Showcase was not your average student art show
Author: Dan Solberg
Site: Kill Screen

Just putting out a bit of self promotion here: I covered the recent NYU Game Center Student Showcase for Kill Screen, and I got to play a ton of inspiring games and talk to some cool people. It was my first MFA games show, and it was pretty fun. I'd definitely attend another.

Anyway, so I ended up leaving some of my personal experience with NYU Game Center out of the article because it wasn't the proper tone, but part of the meaning behind that opening line about a lot changing in two years is that it's also the length of time I've been living in New York City. My time learning my way around the boroughs and trying to build up some kind of games coverage portfolio ran parallel with the the Game Center's debut MFA class that just graduated. Throughout the past two years, I've attended a bunch of video game events (many of them Game Center related), held all over the city, and actually got a feel for what a cultural community around games can feel like. I came here for art, but what I ended up getting the most out of NYC was games, and I think that's a testament to the openness and inclusivity at work in New York's gaming scene. Not to say that video games in NYC is a homogenous entity, but there are definitely common threads.

Now I'm getting ready to leave town, head back to the Midwest and teach art. Having spent two years in New York immersed in games, and the 2.5 years prior in DC working in informal education, I've never felt more prepared to enter the austere world of collegiate art education and try my best to offer an alternative experience to my students. When I came out of art school, I hoped, like many of my classmates, that I could find work doing something, anything that was remotely connected to art, knowing that being a full-time artist is just not in the cards. I feel tremendously lucky in this regard (despite my inability to land an art museum job in NYC, though I've interviewed at most of them) that the experiences I've had have led me to be so uniquely prepared for my position this Fall. I've spent a lot my time in NYC cursing this place, but the gaming community here was always a bright spot, and it made my stay here something I truly value.

Blips: New Media Literacy

Source: Fuck Videogames
Author: Darius Kazemi

Last week, web/interactivity artist Darius Kazemi shared a slide presentation wherein he rallies against the idea of games as the new go-to medium for creative expression. He says that just because games possess qualities that books, welding, and baking don't, that doesn't make them more capable of conveying ideas. Some expression is better suited to one form than another, and I happen to think he's quite right.

More and more it sounds like expressive game design is merging with interdisciplinary art practice. That's the impression I got from Bennett Foddy's (QWOP, Get On Top) lecture at NYU Game Center last year as well. If there's an idea you'd like to externalize, it's worth channeling it through the medium that suits it best. This can even refer to media that you've never used before, but the more options available in your "tool belt," to use Kazemi's term, the better chance you have of creating a successful match.

While it's encouraging to see an institution like NYU Game Center build an MFA program in Game Design, pushing the creative process of game development to the forefront, many studio art MFA programs across the US have already turned interdisciplinary and do not require students to select a medium of focus. This was a big factor for me when I was grad school shopping since I didn't want to enroll in a program where I had to lock myself in as a painter or photographer, largely only associating with people who also specialize in that medium. NYU Game Center has the right idea though, and even if their MFA stays games-only, it would be great to see non-game design students given a chance to cross-pollinate in the program.

If nothing else, I took Kazemi's presentation as a plea to disregard loyalty to any medium. Don't let the label on your Twitter bio hold you back from experimenting with different forms. Expressive mediums aren't people; game design won't be jealous if you take up creative writing periodically. Simply give your creative expression the platform that will make it resonate most powerfully.