Summertime Madness also struggles with its form as a surrealist art gallery within a video game because it still remains entrenched in conservative video game design. Both place art within an aestheticised space for the pleasure of their spectacle. The works will be seen by some who possibly have historical connections or interest in a piece, but many will come to just be in the space with a famous work or for the space itself without taking away much to remember at all.īetween the two, the major difference is the fact that one exists wholly in a virtual world and the other in real space. The space is designed to attract guests and possible donors whether it’s through a plain white box or an immersive series of rooms. Art that was purchased by a series of millionaires line the walls with only a slight string of connections between each work. In a similar fashion, perhaps we can imagine an art gallery in the flatiron district of New York City owned by an oil baron heiress. However, there is a difference between art being placed in a space for aesthetic expression versus being spatialised for environmental spectacle. Seeing something in a game does make me feel something because games are a haptic-visual form. The spiraling hallway of infinity makes me dizzy and question time, the spatialisation of Dali’s The Persistence of Memory catches my eye because it is out of place. Despite the lack of cohesion between all of the pieces existing within the world space, they still make you feel something by just moving through them. The game doesn’t “fail” to make me think because I have to process the game’s images in order to move through it. I’m considering this as an art gallery because I don’t want to discount the inherent value in walking around these environments. Looking around the GalleryĪs Zolani Stewart has written, games have historically and continued to fail presenting images for the comfort of prioritising environmental information. The player walks into a room, works through puzzles over an hour or so, and throughout the process sees various artworks. Rather than thinking of this as the game failing to translate this aesthetic however, it transforms from an atmospheric first-person experience to something more comparable to an art gallery. There is no aesthetic meaning to take away from the collection of surrealist images rendered by the game instead, they are placed to create recognition and spectacle. Rather, in what Esther Rosenfield calls “a container for reference points” in writing about Ghosts of Tsushima. Yet, none of these inclusions are ever given any larger meaning outside of the fairly standard plot of the painter’s escape. This art can also appear very literally as a virtual copy, for instance René Magritte’s sky-filled silhouette from Décalcomanie appearing on a wall. Entire rooms display their inspiration such as a section of endless stairways paralleling M.C. Feeling alone, on the edge of madness, terrorized by the scent of death creeping in from the streets, the artist shook the mysterious man's hand, accepting the deal.Ī few moments later, the house was empty.What’s unique to the visual choices of the game is that a large part of the world is translated from surrealist art into 3D space. But he would have to find his way back out before midnight, or else his soul would become trapped in the canvas forever. The chance to enter one of his own creations, far away and free of war. He then sat down in front of the artist to offer him a deal. The stranger walked slowly around the room, inspecting the paintings. One night, a mysterious figure appeared in the house seemingly out of nowhere. The worse the terrors of war became, the more the artist obsessively painted beautiful landscapes as a contrast to the evil he had witnessed. The city of Prague was under siege, ravaged by war.īuildings were falling, churches were burning, and everything was to be washed away forever.Ī painter lived there, isolated from the outside world. This intriguing world within the canvas holds more mysteries than even the artist intended. But be forewarned, the scene you find yourself in, this breathtaking land of paint and oil is not always as straightforward as it appears. The appearance of a ship, the rise of a lighthouse, each mystery you uncover and puzzle you solve will unfold new wonders and unveil new places to explore. As you investigate your surroundings, the island will start to change. A dreamlike journey into a surreal world of the artist’s own creations where the atmospheric gameplay provides mysteries to discover, puzzles to solve and artistic landscapes to explore. The player, in the role of a painter who has made a deal with the devil, has to find his way back to the real world after being cheated and trapped into one of his canvases.
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