3rd Year Log 1

Tuesday 16/10/12

The last 2 and half weeks had been full of research towards BA7 & BA8’s final project. After seeing the past years documents and circling with ideas, I came up with an original game concept that revolves around the theme of paintings (both the verb & the object). The concept is about a black and white world with no season (almost trying to portray the moon if it had a civilization) that has portals/ gateway in them that leads to various world/ realms of the surreal. The protagonist is the only person in this grey starting world and he/she is able to enter the various realms by jumping into ‘paintings’; the easiest way to explain this is to imagine looking out the window without the window and wall, its just a normal scenery, but once that’s put back in and divides the view into sections, you will discover different compositions and ‘paintings’ in those cropped-out/ framed areas. These so called ‘paintings’ or realms contains a surrealistic take on the real one behind it; often exploring sub-themes such as; romance, comedy, horror, action, etc. However the overall style of the game will be very influenced by the Modern Art Movement which includes; surrealism, cubism, paranoism, pop-art, psychedelic art and so forth, I believe I will be discussing this countless times as I go along and explore it from the research point of view.

The game will then focus on player going back and forth between the real ‘grey’ world and those surreal paintings, at this point there is yet to be a proper narrative or puzzle and design that can justify the reason for my concept, I will further explore that after doing more environmental concepts to dive into the atmosphere. However it is very clear to me that this game will represent immersion and senses of awe in exploration filled with mystery and strange creatures and even mind provoking scenes. The current art direction will be so on the surface it features styles of Van Gogh or Dali or Chirico which are more calming and more passive surrealism, however as we get deeper into the game the art style gradually morphs into a more bizarre, kinetic, almost disturbing like Francis Bacon’s paintings and the downright mischievous like Marcel Duchamp’s work.

I will create a beautiful realm, and then destroy it to bits. (ooh scary)

The game’s working title is ‘Box Of Paintery World’ (referencing Dark Souls)

Essentially, what this project is; is just an excuse for me to read up/ watch a lot of Modern Art influenced movies, documentaries, books and learn how these artists rationalize the process of turning their often daring ideas into a real piece of art. It will also allow me to draw tons of different environmental concepts and bizarre creatures at my own will without being stuck into a norm. This will in turn be a diverse portfolio for me and all that knowledge can then be applied in my future jobs.

I have been into Modern Art (especially Surrealism) ever since my first exposure to this terminology during college few years back, however there weren’t many chances for me to utilize it at the time and eventually steered clear from it, not knowing that this movement have reached its contagious crystallization; its everywhere! In Comic! Films! Advertisings! Architectures! Games!!! (which I will talk about in much greater detail below). So since I have not been that knowledgeable about Modern Art I watched this documentary I found on YouTube that to me act as a deeper exposure of which I will then explore even more individually.

I will research and discuss the followings

-       Modern Art Documentary

-       Influenced in surrealism/ modern art in today’s media

-       History of Game

Modern Art Documentary, a complete guide

This is a documentary that I found on YouTube and it touches upon how the movement came about, its purpose and features many artists that made impacts in that world.

There were a few aspects on how this movement evolved or transit from different eras; the one responsible for this conception was a Post-Impressionism French artist called Paul Cezanne, “The Father of us all” as claimed by Pablo Picasso, who is well know for his Cubism. Another aspects was the Spanish War which conceived ‘Guernica’ paintings, one of which made famous by Picasso depicting the horror of war and act as an anti-war symbol for many artists during the time; they were simply reflecting what was happening at the time, and the result was a fuse between frustration and creativity, a piece of art. In many ways though, this could just be a product of what artists really are in nature; they want to move on and see things in different lights all the time, to be excited again by something different and full of personality. Painting a photographic picture of a room with everyday object it a chore and mundane, however twisting and warping around and with the help of clever compositions, you get work of art like ‘Persistence of Memory’ by Salvador Dali, a self proclaimed genius that was often work described as ‘Hand-painted dream photographs’ blending a sense of surrealism into a realistic scene.

‘Guernica’ by Pablo Picasso

Looking at Dali

Salvador Dali

I then watched an interview of him (also found on YouTube) and try to work out how he worked things out into his drawings, which was unfortunately wasn’t discussed much here, the interview is more of a publicity event and its done well to depict Dali as a very eccentric person. However I was able to learn about his influences that comes oddly enough from a different realm altogether; Modern Physics. Although at the time of interview he was exploring the theme of Religion, the man had been interested in things like Anti-Matter, Cosmology and Psychology and even going on about how “Death is sublime and unbeautiful, but also erotic” and further added that he was indeed contradictory of his own ideals and that he was a paradoxical man.

The Persistence of Memory (La Persistance De La Memoire)

The Enigma Of Desire – my Mother, my Mother, my Mother

(L’enigme Du Desir – Ma mere, ma mere , ma mere)

Girrafe on Fire (Girafe En Flammes)

More Modern Artists, their works and some of their quotes;

Vincent Van Gogh

 “I don’t paint the world as I see it, I paint as I imagine it.”

-Vincent Van Gogh

 Giorgio De Chirico

The Anxious Journey

Melancholy and Mystery of a street

The Red Tower

Tragedy of Serenity, paintings by Giorgio De Chirico (above). which influenced the game ICO. (below)

More artists that were featured; Mondrian, Francis Bacon, Francuzi, De Silva, Marcel Duchamp, Andy Warhol, Ruschenberg and so many more, all coming from different sides of the same core; Cubism, Futurism, Dadaism, Paranoism, Graffiti, Abstraction, Kinetic Art, Expressionism, Pop art, etc.

So In conclusion, I see this movement as an extension in one’s ideals; a form of self indulgence in an artistic approach that could be dubbed as brilliant or even bizarre by many. One of the artist in the Documentary claimed that all he wanted to do was just to immerse himself in another world with no rules, detached from the mundane and unsatisfying reality, again this could be viewed by anyone in 2 ways; adventurous or just as an excuse to escape responsibilities.

In relation to this project, my work contains analogies and metaphors of exploration and being in a haven, of being free from just 1 reality, for eg. Jumping into paintings, the ‘black and white’ and mundane ‘real’ world and such. This project is an extension of my ideals therefore in that sense; my work is in spirit, a piece of Modern Art (at least that’s what I’d like to think). Which is an aspect that I will cover next.

Influences of Modern Art in today’s media

It is immense, both visually and in spirit, International Films such as Donnie Darko, Requiem of A Dream, Sunshine, 2001: Space odyssey, Pi, Big Fish, Edward Scissorshand, Girl Who leapt Through Time, Paprika. Comics done by Steve Ditko, Kago Shintaro, Alan Moore (will also look into these guys more some time), tons of Digital Photography today has taken the theme of surrealism and of course games. Some of the more notably influenced Games are; ICO, Alice Madness Return, Papo and Yo (most recent one to date) and even Classics like Super Mario series or Zelda or Tetris even. Visually, surrealism plays on the idea of perception and representations, by this definition alone its is safe to say that all pixel based games are Surreal because they represents images which are usually unique to the person seeing it. Nowadays games are graphically enhanced and although the vagueness had been polished to fine details, I believe it is losing too much personality, simply put in my opinion; if every game are going to be realistic then there is no point in immersing yourself in games or movies anymore, there has to be an element of surrealism in it, be it in the plot or visually or musically and such. So it has been unreal looking back on how Modern Art had affected the world as we know it, all this time it has been everywhere, just as subtler versions of it.

However I believe a Video Game is still a Game and not meant to be Movies or Installation art disguised AS a game, without sufficient interactivity and right engagement from the players, then there isn’t a point in making it, part of the beauty of playing games also comes from the satisfaction of beating a challenge/ puzzle. Similarly in Modern Art movement, creating a piece is sometimes considered as a struggle and that’s what art is all about, a struggle to get to a higher understanding. All these aspects creates an immersion which I consider to be the core of everything, this is the aspects that made me started drawing, playing games and music altogether and I believe that I could create the same to others.

History Of Video Games

Another video I stumbled upon in YouTube. It talks about how the first games came about to how different companies emerges and became the industries that they are today, it explores Games like Pong, Space Invaders, Donkey Kong, etc and companies such as Atari, the Oliver Twins and Darling Brothers colab, Nintendo, etc.

Here are some Trivia that I’ve learnt along the way;

-Atari was named after a move in the Game Of Go, when you’re about to take over your opponent’s tiles.

-Atari’s Pong’s origin was controversially from Ralph Baer, who invented the Magnavox’s Odyssey

-Activision is a product of Engineers and game designers that came together after being neglected in Atari (due to the company being sold to new regimes.)

-The Oliver Twins created Road Runner when they were only 12 years old

-       The twins collaborated with Darling Brothers who were also young designers and worked through post mails to prevent companies monopolizing their sales profit

-They created ‘Dizzy’ which is massive contribution of game design (games are now created by gamers FOR gamers!)

-Nintendo used to be a traditional card game seller

-Mario was initially Jump Man in Donkey Kong

-Shigeru Miyamoto believe that games draws out emotions from people, and he claims that his games are reflection of his childhood

-Legend of Zelda was inspired by his childhood exploration when he stumbles upon a massive lake on a mountain

-Miyamoto wrote his own music

-Tetris, the Russian originated game comes from the Greek word Tetra which means 4 and Russian puzzle called Pentanamos.

-Tetris was originally written to test computers

Looking at Shigeru Miyamoto’s work, it’s not that difficult to say that he was a real Modern Artist in his own way, maybe different visually but very true to it spiritually. The game Mario Bros always contains different ‘worlds’ that has different themes and personalities to them, memorable characters, satisfying challenges and most of all interesting design and visuals that are definitely out of the norm; mushrooms that makes one grow, massive pipes that you travel in and out of, floating boxes full of unknown surprises, platforms made of clouds and much more. The same applies in Legend of Zelda, except he added a simple aspect of the protagonist that is able to empathize with the audience even more, a boy.

Of course looking at our world today, the games that are widely popular seems to have evolved even more; to 5 minute ‘fast-food’ games which are usually in the smart-phone platforms like Temple Run, Angry Birds or Online Multiplayer like COD or WOW which are also brilliant but with different intention. However there are also still surprises emerging from time to time, whether they are downright pleasant or not is irrelevant, because atmospheric games like Journey, ICO, Papo & Yo, Dead Space, Dear Esther, Lone Survivor, Portal do make a difference in the industry by keeping the expressive side of gaming alive. Of course there are tons of other immersive games such as GTA, Skyrim, Dishonored, Borderlands that I enjoy as well but I just think games could be much more than just entertainment.