Refresh×Fantoche#2
The “REFRESH x Fantoche #2” exhibition presents works at the interface of art, design and technology. The key themes of the group show are immersive journalism, playful experiments and identity/gender.
All the projects take an activist approach – the designers boldly combine a wide variety of technologies to express the urgency of their narratives in an extremely creative, contemporary and immersive manner. It is not uncommon for them to push their artistic practice to the boundaries of their respective disciplines. In this way, the artists also invite us to experiment, to enjoy playing and to free ourselves from conventions.
At times deeply sad, yet sometimes hilarious, at other times critical but always deeply personal – the 16 works challenge visitors in a variety of ways and invite them to reflect on such themes as politics, society, diversity and identity.
“REFRESH x Fantoche #2” is a collaboration between the Department of Design at Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and Fantoche.
Curated by Maike Thies (Research Fellow, Zurich University of the Arts, Department of Design). The technical director is Stefan Kraft (Research Fellow, Zurich University of the Arts, Department of Design).
Dissecting Love; a Queer Autopsy of a Relationship
Noe Mael Arnold, BA, Subject Area in Game Design 2023
«Dissecting Love» is an emotional exploration game that invites players to use text and object manipulation to discover the reasons for the ending of a queer relationship. Players unravel the story of the relationship's demise by dissecting and transforming multiple objects while exploring themes of personal growth and introspection.
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id
Miyu Sawamoto, BA, Fachrichtung Game Design 2023
«id» is a 3D puzzle adventure game. The NPC named «id» is a guide who leads the player through the game. However, the focus is on the game experience itself because of the intuitive gameplay: satisfying animations and interactions meet dark visuals with dark endings. «id» only exists for you and creates itself based on your gameplay.
Psychotic Bathtub
natsha, 2023
«Psychotic Bathtub» addresses Ophelia’s experience with her slightly odd, highly disturbing, and entirely unique psychotic disorder in her bathtub. Interact with the environment through Ophelia’s eyes: Argue with your rubber duck, drink wine, add more bathwater. Each of your interactions may lead to death, great joy, or even worse: your duck drowns, the wine turns into poison, the bathroom is flooded. Will you find a way out of the really scary parts of your mind? Maybe not.
Henry Halfhead
Lululu Entertainment, 2023
Meet Henry, merely half a head but with the peculiar ability to possess and control any object within their reach. Discover every object's unique properties and abilities and cleverly combine them to progress through Henry's not-so-ordinary everyday life.
![© Chantlings Iorama [Eran Hilleli, Finn Ericson], 2023](/_default_upload_bucket/1963/image-thumb__1963__galleryCarousel/chantlings%20image@2x.webp "© Chantlings Iorama [Eran Hilleli, Finn Ericson], 2023")
Chantlings
Iorama [Eran Hilleli, Finn Ericson], 2023
It was a balmy summer evening when some strange creatures met in a forest clearing to sing a serene song. Players soon wish for this summer evening never to end. The singing app «Chantlings», developed in cooperation with Finn Ericson, invites them to join this enchanting choir and sing their favourite songs together.
Showcase Design: In cooperation with the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich, Ausstellung «Game Design Today».
Finding Hannah
Fein Games, 2023
Hannah’s got it all: a well-paying job, a fancy coffee machine, and a comfortable life – so why isn’t she happy? Join her on a journey of self-discovery as she tries to uncover what’s really important to her. Finding Hannah combines beautiful hidden object scenes with compelling merge gameplay to tell an intergenerational story about happiness, love, and family. Hannah’s mother Sigrid rebelled against the establishment her entire life, but was mostly absent at home. Hannah’s grandmother Eva grew up during a frightening time – and learned to let others make decisions for her. Can these three women overcome their differences to learn from one another?
Jerks
Iorama [Eran Hilleli, Finn Ericson], 2023
The Jerks ist ein Live-Motion-Capture-Experiment für alle!
Eine Auswahl an Jerks gibt ihr Bestes, um die Bewegungen echter Menschen auf überraschende und unterhaltsame Weise zu imitieren. Richtet die Kamera einfach auf eine Person im Raum und sieh zu, wie sie sich in einen Jerk verwandelt.
Grund Genug
Simone Stolz, BA-Diplomarbeit Knowledge Visualization, 2023
In «Grund Genug», the author seeks to find access to a dark chapter of Swiss history, which is not long in the past: until a few decades ago, hundreds of thousands of youngsters and children were cared for in Swiss children’s homes, often for many years. This book contains a collection of anecdotes and experiences. It offers a multi-faceted and personal approach to history and contributes to its visibility.
Dream’in Zone
Fabienne Giezendanner, 2020
An interactive and immersive fiction for VR head set. Yuri, a 60 year old Korean woman, remembers the first day of spring when she had just turned 10. She had decided to leave her mother's home in South Korea to find her father, a violinist soldier, held up in the North. A formidable adventure awaits her in the demilitarized zone at once heavenly and terrifying. Following the memories of the now-grown-up Yuri, the audience will take part in this incredible adventure on the most dangerous, yet beautiful, area of the planet that is the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas.
YOU DESTROY. WE CREATE.
Now Here Media, 2022, 25:22 Minuten
Werden Sie Zeuge, wie die ukrainische Kunst und Kultur zur Zielscheibe des andauernden Krieges geworden sind, und lernen Sie die inspirierenden Menschen kennen, die an den Fronten stehen, um sie zu schützen. Was passiert, wenn Museen ihre Sammlungen nicht mehr zeigen können, sondern sie verstecken müssen? Was bedeutet es, ein Straßenkünstler zu sein, wenn die eigene Stadt bombardiert wird? Was bedeutet es, Musiker zu sein, wenn das eigene Land angegriffen wird? "Ihr zerstört. We Create" nimmt Sie mit auf eine 25-minütige Reise durch das vom Krieg zerstörte Land, wo Künstler und Kulturschaffende damit beschäftigt sind, das Land zu schützen, wieder aufzubauen und Kunst zu schaffen.
Hardly Working
Total Refusal, Film 2022 / 4 channel video installation, 2021
Hardly Working gives priority to characters that normally fade into the background of video games: NPCs. NPCs are non-playable characters that populate hyper real worlds to create the appearance of normality. Usually these digital extras play no major role in the story of the game. Here a laundress, a stableman, a street sweeper, and a handyman are the four main characters of this film. With ethnographic precision, the film observes their daily work: a rhythm composed of loops that makes them work daily and tirelessly. Their work neither results in a product, nor does it change anything about their status quo. In light of Hannah Arendt description of ‘animal laborans’ – in contrast to the acting subject –, the NPCs as individuum are an exaggeration as their work performance actually manifests their status.
Here, work becomes a pure performance, carried out for its own sake. NPCs perform so-called surrogate actions that generate no social benefit. These actions are performed and enforced for the sake of appearances to ensure a social order.
NPCs are digital Sisyphus machines that have no perspective of breaking out of their activity loops. In the moments when the algorithm of their existence shows inconsistencies, the NPCs break out of the logic of total normality, display their own faultiness, and appear touchingly human.
Posthuman Wombs/Virtual Wombs
Anan Fries, Malu Peeters, 2021
«POSTHUMAN WOMBS» is a 28-minute VR-trip by Anan Fries and A virtual essay, a tender trip into the belly of the pregnant Posthuman. Here, gender is not binary and nature and technology are not in opposition to one another. Its pregnancy, rather, is technology. Its body is fiction and reality. An autotheoretical exploration of non-normative pregnancies and the desire to find a community. It is a speculation with a future in which all bodies can be pregnant.
Frontiers
gold extra, 2012
«Frontiers» is a politically-charged machinima that challenges the conventional boundaries of game narrative and the potential for social dialogue within the gaming community. A dynamic reimagining of the Half-Life 2 engine, the game allows players to assume roles of refugees or various authorities, experiencing the real-life migratory journey from Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe, fraught with border conflicts and the struggle for survival.
The game, on which the machinima is based, is rooted in extensive field research conducted in Ukraine, Slovakia, Spain, and Morocco, incorporating authentic interviews with refugees, aid workers, and authorities. This serves to humanize the often faceless discourse surrounding global migration, grounding it in real stories and lived experiences.
The Fallen
gold extra 2017
"THE FALLEN" deals with the Ukraine war in a haunting way and, contrary to what might be expected from the game's first-person shooter setting, foregrounds the untold stories of the victims of the conflict. Although the project was realised in 2017 by the artisting group gold extra, the game has sadly lost none of its relevance. Amidst the ghostly ruins of a destroyed airport in the disputed eastern regions of Ukraine, "THE FALLEN" involves the players in a brutal conflict without heroes: Who is the victim, who is the aggressor - the boundaries become increasingly blurred as the game progresses and present the players with ethical challenges.
Ugly
Nikita Diakur, 2017, 12 Minuten
An ugly cat struggles to coexist in a fragmented and broken world, eventually finding a soulmate in a mystical chief. Inspired by the internet story ‘Ugly the Cat’.
Fest
Nikita Diakur, 2018, 2:55 Minuten
Footage from a block party. Rave, drone, bbq and icecream. Then a stunt. Youtube inspired and simulated.
«Fest» is a tribute to Youtube culture. Similar to the protagonists in fail compilations, characters in «Fest» are dealing with unexpected results, extreme situations and chaos. Freedom and spontaneity are common elements and are picked up within the animation. The technique is a combination of puppeteering and dynamic computer simulation and varies between physically accurate and broken. Like the fail heroes on Youtube, the animator is never fully in control. Animating like this feels closer to real-life filmmaking: the simulation results are unpredictable and personal. Accordingly, the focus shifts from outcome to process. The animator is left with the challenge to find the right balance between control and chaos.