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San Francisco Bay Guardian -- Arse Elektronika brings new meaning to 'grab my joystick'

Fucking polygons, fucking pixels: On procedural representations of sex / Arse Elektronika 2012

Paolo Pedercini of Molleindustria on procedural representations of sex in videogames.
Talk given at Arse Elektronika 2012.

Arse Elektronika (not to be confused with the similarly sounding, slightly more established new media art festival in Linz) is the most important conference investigating the intersection of sex and technology. The past six editions revolved around themes like porn as innovation driver, sexuality in science fiction or body enhancements. This year the emphasis was on games and the three day festival included performances, workshops, and an eclectic mix of lectures: from the challenges of simulating sexual intercourse in Nordic LARPs to the dating strategies among volunteers in disaster zones, from the physics of vibrators and sex machines to the auto-ethnography of masturbation…
My talk simply dealt with the procedural representation of sex in videogames. I publish the presentation here, along with most of the images and videos I screened. The text is a transcript quickly adjusted to the written form so forgive me for the colloquial style, the repetitions and the wonky grammar.

Summary
What is the role of sex in the functionalist worlds of videogames? How come that modeling intercourses through cybernetic systems seems only to produce hilarious, problematic and delightfully reductionist outcomes?
In this gonzo survey of playable coitus, I descend from the prudish polish of AAA games to the subappreciated subterranean genre of interactive pornography (so you don’t have to) and then re-emerge to envision alternative design approaches for healthy, sex-positive, post-pornographic, radical games.

The Digital and Analogue Subversion of monochrom: Günther Friesinger @ furtherfield

Once, when I was living in Moscow before 2011, I was informed about monochrom by recommendation of my friend: the activist initiatives of this art group from Vienna seemed fascinating due to its art-tech philosophy and it put a smile on my face due to its pop attitude. Later on in Linz Günther Friesinger, one of the creators of monochrom, gave a lecture to Media Art Histories students of the Donau Universität, which inspired me to arrange an interview with him. The first question I asked was about establishing monochrom. Günther explained that “monochrom came into being in 1993 as a fanzine for cyberculture, science, theory, cultural studies and the archeology of pop culture in every-day life. Its collage format is reminiscent of both the early DIY fanzines of the punk and new wave underground and the art books of figures such as Dieter Roth, Martin Kippenberger and others. For a while now, monochrom have been venturing further than publishing alone, and have been responsibly influencing people’s minds via film production, performances and festivals. If you are in Vienna in autumn by chance, have a look at the paraflows festival - one of the main projects run by monochrom.

KillScreen Magazine: "Stories about orcs and rape": the man behind Arse Elektronika

A chat with Johannes Grenzfurthner, the brainiest pervert of them all.

Arse Elektronika's 2012 incarnation was, to my mind, the world's first sex-positive, sex-focused gaming conference. It was hosted by Johannes Grenzfurthner, of the philosophy/art/tech consortium Monochrom. The genial host is part MC, part mad professor, tossing around PHD-level queer theory one moment, posing for wacky photos and explaining “game-i-fuckation” the next.

We caught up with Grenzfurthner just after the show ended, to chat about finding, selecting and showcasing the finest examples of sex-gaming crossovers in the world.

Let's Play With The World: Games, Art, Activism and other subversions @ IndieCade 2012

This panel invites five game designers who are also artists to discuss the boundary between art, games and activism. It is a standard reflex for people to think they are helpless in the face of mighty governments and corporate power. But in a media-based society, everything is controlled by a "cultural grammar of the public space": the habits and conventions of society, our ways of speaking and thinking, the images and stereotypes which give short-cuts to meaning in our lives. That means that the power wielded by big institutions is more like a fluid or a jelly than a solid brick wall, and we can play with it. So let us - as game designers, game players, artists, activists and other fellow nerds - leave our cozy peer-groups and comfy scenes behind, and talk about what we can do to play with the world.

KillScreen: "At Arse Elektronika, the world's biggest gaming and sex conference"

Sex games, (and games about sex, and sexual devices with gameplay elements, and so on), certainly have a ways to go before they become "mainstream" in any real way, if they ever do at all. Perhaps that's a large part of the appeal – attendi ng Arse Elektronika – particularly the opening ceremony - felt like an introduction to gaming's most truly subversive and "underground" space, a sort of heady, sex-positive mirror universe to the goings on of say, PAX. These folks are innovating the medium – one dirty little demo at a time.

monochrom's Massive Multiplayer Thumb-Wrestling @ IndieCade 2012

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