Feb 8 - 23, 2014

Impedance: Games & Resistance

Vector Festival 2014

InterAccess presents Impedance, an exhibition featuring works by Molleindustria w/ Jim Munroe, Alex Myers, Kent Sheely, Lucas Pope, Soha El-Sabaawi, Martin Le Chevallier, Gordan Savicic, RuneStorm, Andy Campbell & Mez Breeze, and Oscar Raby.


Molleindustria w/ Jim Munroe, Unmanned, 2012, installation view

Videogames are increasingly becoming tools to address contemporary politics and act as forms of resistance. As catalysts for critical conversations surrounding a broad variety of issues, game artists produce works that critique real world issues as much as they reflect on the medium of digital games. Addressing the politics of surveillance, warfare, mass media and propaganda, privacy, and mass-mediated violence, the works in this exhibition challenge you to engage with difficult issues by interacting with experimental games, interactive installations, text adventures, art games, a VR documentary, and game mods. The issues and questions raised by the works in this exhibition are ubiquitous in the contemporary world. Among others, they concern social justice, inefficient and overbearing control apparatuses, the saturation of public spaces with locked and proprietary networks, torture, and the trauma of terrorism and warfare. 


Alex Myers, Winning, 2013, installation view

But despite the seriousness of these issues, it is important to note that these artworks develop playful approaches to the negotiation of difficult subjects – approaches that expand conventional ideas of videogames, that require you to reflect on sinister topics through playful experimentation, and that subvert videogaming conventions in order to elevate the form beyond simple entertainment. It is equally important to note that the ‘challenge’ that these works pose to the viewer should be taken literally: don’t hesitate to pick up a controller or mouse and explore what this exhibition has to offer in digital narratives, conceptual art, and critical commentary.


Oscar Raby, Assent, 2013, installation view

 

This exhibition is a co-presentation with Vector Game + Art Convergence, a festival dedicated to showcasing contemporary game based artworks.

Join us for the opening reception on Feb 8th from 4pm-7pm at InterAccess.

More information can be found at www.vectorfestival.org.

Photography by Robin Hamill, 2014

***

RELATED:



VECTOR EVENTS @ INTERACCESS
February 22–23, 2014

 

 

 

Past exhibition
Oct 17 - 24, 2023

Digital Constellations: Making Our Own Seat at the Table

Partnering with Indigenous Youth Roots (formerly known as Canadian Roots Exchange), InterAccess is thrilled to present Digital Constellations: Making Our Own Seat at the Table—an official selection feature at the 2023 imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival. Curated by Amanda Amour-Lynx.

More
Past exhibition
Sep 6 - Oct 21, 2023

Remember Tomorrow: A Telidon Story―Curated by Shauna Jean Doherty

Presented in honour of InterAccess’s 40th anniversary this exhibition celebrates Telidon, the Canadian-made technology that inspired the artists who founded InterAccess in 1983.

More
Past exhibition
Jul 6 - 16, 2023

VF23 Multi-site Exhibition | Anthropo-Digitalism

Curated by keiko hart. Featuring works by Marisa Fulper-Estrada, Jon McCurley, Kristin McWharter, Lorna Mills, Sunny Nestler, and Seth Scriver.

More
Back to: News
Back to: Shop
Back to: Shop
Back to: Events
Back to: Exhibitions
Back to: Workshops
Back to: Home
Back to Top