Work

At the 2015 VIA Games Salon: Rules for Another Self, an exhibition and experimental arcade, I explored various indie artists' work through the game medium in their attempt to disassemble standard frameworks of performance, gender, and power. The most eye-opening piece of digital art I experienced while I was there, however, was KWAAN, an online indie multi-player exploration-based adventure.
KWAAN advertises itself as an online adventure world about nature, myth, and play; however, what it offers to its expansive audience from imaginative young children to veteran adult gamers alike is an immersive experience in a dynamic ecosystem that thrives on the cooperation of players in performing tribal rituals, beautifying the pixel environment, and interacting with one another to create life, all for the sake of nurturing the spirit of the world, KWAAN, and maintaining the beauty and harmony of the gentle atmosphere. Interestingly, the game began as an experiment commissioned by a French cognitive science laboratory to test the theory of engagement, a key idea in the integration of technology in learning. Through KWAAN, one becomes invested in performing profoundly important tasks to the society and meaningfully interacting with others, blurring the boundaries between the intimate and the collective.