Panel Statement

Panel: Games Betwixt and Between

Some­where in be­tween the dingy mall ar­cade and the gallery per­for­mance space sits the new ar­cade. At ex­per­i­men­tal game spaces such as New York’s Baby­cas­tles, and ar­cade events such as Koko­romi’s Gamma, games by (and for) artists min­gle with quirky au­teur ex­per­i­ments; game in­dus­try hope­fuls rub shoul­ders with DJs and mu­si­cians, elec­tronic artists, and artis­tic voyeurs.  The de­sign and cu­ra­tion of such games de­mands a holis­tic per­spec­tive on game­play that ac­knowl­edges and en­cour­ages fluid move­ment be­tween game­play, spec­ta­tor­ship, and emer­gent col­lec­tive ex­pe­ri­ence. The re­sult is a so­cial and per­for­ma­tive hy­brid—aes­theti­cized play. This paper con­tex­tu­al­izes “art”-cade and per­for­ma­tive pub­lic gam­ing, and ex­plores how the new ar­cade en­gages ca­sual and in­dis­crim­i­nant acts of ludic ex­pe­ri­ence.

• Cindy Poremba is a dig­i­tal media re­searcher, cre­ator and cu­ra­tor, ex­plor­ing the in­ter­sec­tion of doc­u­men­tary, videogames and in­ter­ac­tive art through Con­cor­dia Uni­ver­sity’s Doc­toral Hu­man­i­ties pro­gram (Montréal, Canada). She holds an MASc in In­ter­ac­tive Arts from Simon Fraser Uni­ver­sity, as well as a BA from the Uni­ver­sity of Wa­ter­loo (Canada) in Rhetoric & Pro­fes­sional Writ­ing.