Homo Ludens Ludens
HOMO LUDENS LUDENS
Locating play in contemporary culture and society
Exhibition: 18 April – 22 September
Conference: 19 – 20 April
Venue: LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón
LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial presents HOMO LUDENS LUDENS, an international exhibition and conference examining play as a principal element of today’ s world, and highlighting its necessity for our contemporary societies. Following the exhibitions GAMEWORLD and PLAYWARE, that reflected respectively on the different playful and social sides of gaming creativity and interactive art, HOMO LUDENS LUDENS now sets the setting that embraces these data and looks into the notion of play in a wider spectrum, presenting how it has evolved in our digital times.
Projects of a different character and orientation reflect play’s various expressions and roles: Play is being reformed and reversed; it embodies social and political acts and issues; it becomes a tool for activism; it mingles the virtual and the real; it revitalizes other disciplines; play can be misused and exploited; while stereotypes are challenged, questions are raised and different understandings are offered.
Following the same direction, the international conference HOMO LUDENS LUDENS which is co-organized with the Planetary Collegium aims through its two-day programme to situate the frame context of contemporary play, to highlight its interdisciplinary character and to present the multifaceted reality of the playful society we are living in. To achieve this, the Conference forms a special setting for dialogue and experimentation where it brings together international experts from the field of game theory as well as artists and practitioners who embrace elements and signs of play and playfulness in their work and research activities.
So, what is play today and what about the player? The exhibition and conference can be understood as an examination of play as a vital element in our everyday life and as a speculation on the emergence of a Homo Ludens Ludens – the contemporary player of games.
Exhibiting Artists:
John Paul Bichard
France Cadet
Derivart
Devart
Hannah Perner-Wilson & Mika Satomi
Ge Jin
Vladan Joler
Radwan Kasmiya
John Klima
La Fiambrera Obrera & Mar de Niebla
Danny Ledonne
Valeriano López
Ludic Society
Marcin Ramocki & Justin Strawhand
Martin Pichlmair & Fares Kayali
Brian Mackern
Larry Miller
MIT Lab - Drew Harry, Dietmar Offenhuber, Orkan Telhan
Molleindustria
David Valentine/MediaShed (ft. Methods of Movement)
Julian Oliver
Orna Portugaly, Daphna Talithman, Sharon Younger
Personal Cinema & the Erasers
Rolando Sánchez
Alex Sanjurjo
Gordan Savicic
Axel Stockburger
Silver & True
Román Torre
Volker Morawe & Tilman Reiff
William Wegman
Conference Speakers:
Roy Ascott
Laura Baigorri
Laura Beloff
Erich Berger
José Luis de Vincente
Julian Dibbell
Daphne Dragona
Wolfgang Fiel
Gonzalo Frasca
Luis Miguel Girão
Margarete Jahrmann
McKenzie Wark
David Mcconville
Guto Nóbrega
Julian Oliver
Paolo Pedercini
Martin Pichlmair
Anne Marie Schleiner
Mike Phillips
Michael Punt
Nicolas Reeves
Natacha Roussel
Semi Ryu
Natasha Vita-More
Monika Weiss
Conference Co-Organizers: Planetary Collegium
Curatorial team:
Erich Berger, Chief Curator, LABoral Centro de Arte de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón
Laura Baigorri, Independet Curator, Barcelona
Daphne Dragona, New Media Arts Curator, Athens