I felt very attracted to Flanagan’s idea that ‘Critical Play Can Mean Toying with the Notion of Goals’, which is a notion that hadn’t crossed my mind before enrolling in art school. The article mentioned Molleindustria a couple times, which did not surprise me, as one of their games made me realize that rules need not apply. A Short History of the Gaze, which was shown at Weird Reality: Art && Code in 2016, made me think about games in a way I never had before. The game progresses through different levels engaging the viewer in gazing, all of which are intended to make the player feel invasive, uncomfortable, vulnerable or even violent.
I have been having a hard time merging the Critical and the Play in my work, which is something I would really like to work on this last semester at CMU. I feel like my pieces fluctuate between empty/fun and deep/serious, whilst all of my favorite interactive artworks always merge both. The notion of critical play is important because it is engaging, thus enables thought and progress. Unfortunately, it is much harder to achieve within a piece of work than it is to talk about.