in-game photography

EVENT: THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S GUIDE TO LOS SANTOS (MAY 25 - JUNE 23 2024, LENZBURG, SWITZERLAND)

Image courtesy of Mattia Dagani Rio, 2023

What does it feel like being a photographer in Los Santos? A new group exhibition aptly titled The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos which will be featured at the Lenzburg Fotofestival in Lenzburg, Switzerland, from May 25 to June 23, 2024, tries to answer that very question. Turns out there are many answers.

The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos

May 25 - June 23 2024

Curated by Marco De Mutiis and Matteo Bittanti

Thu-Fri: 2-5 PM
Sat-Sun: 10 AM–5 PM

Dammweg 19
5600 Lenzburg
Switzerland

The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos interrogates the ontological boundaries between physical and virtual spaces through an examination of photographic practices within the ludic framework of Rockstar North’s record-breaking 2013 Grand Theft Auto V. Situating Los Santos as a simulacrum of Los Angeles —the epicenter of global image production —  the exhibition explores the emergence of this fictional locale as a site of artistic experimentation and critical inquiry.

The exhibition is part of an ongoing investigation into expanded photographic practices using video games and game development tools, such as game engines. The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos presents seminal works by artists working at the intersection of post-photography, video games and art, including 2girls1comp, Raphael Brunk, Alan Butler, Mattia Dagani Rio, Elizabeth Desintaputri, Claire Hentschker, COLL.EO, and Georgie Roxby Smith. 

Through meticulous in-game capture techniques and cunning manipulations of code, this cadre of international artists rupture the veneer of mimetic realism that shrouds Los Santos, opening fissures wherein the underlying algorithms and tacit ideological assumptions underpinning these contested spaces are exposed. At once playful and critical, the featured projects — several of which have never been presented before — challenge the stability of categories such as the virtual, the real, and the hyperreal within an increasingly gamified culture.

The exhibition will be accompanied by an online resource and a database detailing significant post-photographic interventions within Grand Theft Auto V and, later on, a “how-to-photograph-the-virtual” critical guide.  

Read more about The Photographer’s Guide to Los Santos

FOTOLUDICA: OVER 500 ATTENDEES AT IULM UNIVERSITY

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Over 500 Attendees at Italy’s First Conference on In-Game Photography

Milan, Italy – IULM University hosted the pioneering Fotoludica conference on March 14 and 15, 2024, marking a significant milestone in the recognition of in-game photography as an emerging art form. Curated by Matteo Bittanti and Marco De Mutiis, the event attracted over 500 participants, highlighting its success and the growing interest in this cutting-edge field.

Fotoludica, brought together a diverse group of attendees, not limited to IULM students. The conference saw participation from students across various universities and art schools, including a notable class from the Milan Academy of Art of Brera, led by esteemed curator Domenico Quaranta.

The event unfolded in the Sala dei 146 at IULM 6, Università IULM, offering two days filled with insightful talks, presentations, and discussions. It served as a vibrant platform for creators, researchers, and theorists to explore the intersections of video games, photography, copyright law, activism, and visual culture.

Fotoludica tackled various facets of in-game photography, from the artistry of photo modes and screenshot hacks to the legalities concerning player-created images. The conference featured analyses of works by renowned artists such as Boris Camaca, Leonardo Magrelli, Simone Santilli, Alan Butler, Pascal Greco, Joseph DeLappe and Adonis Archontides, showcasing the depth and creativity possible within virtual gaming worlds.

Key topics included the use of photography for architectural visualization in games like Minecraft, documenting in-game performance art, and contemporary war photography. Discussions delved into the ways gaming environments, when viewed through a photographic lens, can expose themes of violence, labor exploitation, and colonial ideologies.

The lineup of speakers spanned diverse fields, including art history, visual culture, game development, and internet law, with keynotes by Marco De Mutiis on “Playable Imaging” and a special conversation between artist Joseph DeLappe and scholar Laura Leuzzi. Panel discussions led by Bittanti and De Mutiis critically examined the boundaries of creativity, authorship, and ethics in photographic practices using game engines.

Fotoludica has not only established in-game photography as a significant art form but also underscored IULM University's leading role in the scholarly exploration of photography within game studies. The conference’s success in fostering multidisciplinary dialogue sets a new benchmark for artistic interrogation of games, bridging the worlds of photography and machinima.

Fotoludica was the first of a series of events organized by IULM University on the topic of in-game photography as part of an ongoing research. Additional initiatives will take place in May 2024. For more information on the Fotoludica conference and its contributions to the field, please contact Matteo Bittanti at matteo.bittanti@iulm.it

Contact Information:

Matteo Bittanti

Università IULM

Via Carlo Bo, 2

20143 Milano

Event Information: Fotoludica
Date: March 14-15, 2024
Time: 10 AM - 1 PM
Location: Sala dei 146, IULM 6, Università IULM

MMF MMXXIV: GINA HARA, RESIDENT ARTIST

The Milan Machinima Festival is proud to welcome acclaimed filmmaker Gina Hara as our inaugural Artist-in-Residence.

During her upcoming festival residency in Milan, Ms. Hara will present her latest work, partecipate in the upcoming In-Game Photography conference, while also leading a 1-day workshop for students enrolled in IULM’s Master of Arts in Television, Cinema and New Media, and specifically in the course taught by Matteo Bittanti entitled Video Games, Technology and Art.

Ms. Hara’s current projects build upon her extensive background in the context of game design, digital community and experimental cinema. As Creative Director of Montreal’s Technoculture, Art and Games Research Centre, she spearheads initiatives melding artistic imagination with videogame technology.

As an interdisciplinary artist, Ms. Hara holds an MA in Intermedia and an MFA in Film Production. Her broad experience encompasses film, video, gaming, new media and design. Her 2011 fiction short Waning received a Best Canadian Short nomination at the Toronto International Film Festival. Over the past decade, Ms. Hara has pioneered new frontiers in both filmmaking and creative Minecraft game video productions.

A true visionary in machinima filmmaking, Ms. Hara is the 2022 recipient of the prestigious Critics’ Choice Award for her stunning Sidings of the Afternoon. Unfolding entirely within Minecraft’s blocky realms, the work weaves an artistic dialogue across digital and physical realms, drawing inspiration from the photography and film innovations of legendary Bauhaus figure László Moholy-Nagy. Specifically, Hara explores how the Bauhaus movement’s ideals, creative techniques and uniting of fine art with function still reverberate through contemporary imagination and virtual spaces today. The film’s nonlinear narrative emerges through the lens of Maya Deren’s avant-garde classic Meshes of the Afternoon.

 
 

Her groundbreaking work Valley (2023) was featured in Season 3 of the VRAL. Inspired by the growing prevalence of AI counseling services, Hara developed a custom chatbot named Robin to simulate conversations spanning emotional issues like anxiety, self-doubt and growth. The dialogues touch on quintessentially human questions of purpose, connection and inner peace. Setting these intimate debates within a fantastical blocky gaming realm adds layers of irony and underscores the gulf between AI logical thinking and nuances of human psychology.

 
 

Her earlier film Geek Girls (2017) was screened at IULM in 2019 as part of the university’s Gender Play series events exploring the role of women in gaming culture. This original documentary reveals the overlooked women within fan communities. In fact, although geeky pop culture has gained prominence and visibility, little attention has focused on the many women shaping these worlds.With insight and humor, Hara’s camera follows female gamers, coders and sci-fi fans. She captured their exhilaration and solidarity, but also their frequent exclusion within male-dominated nerd spheres. From professional gamers facing online harassment to women developers battling death threats, Geek Girls spotlights a complex multiplicity of female experiences. Some women find community, some encounter gatekeeping. Most see both. Through intimate interviews, the film unpacks women’s engagement with today’s geek culture. Hara grapples with her own geeky identity on camera, situating herself within the world explored.

 
 

No less remarkable is Hara’s 2015 immersive multimedia installation that transforms the popular game Minecraft into a thought-provoking experiment on the rise and fall of civilizations, MindCraft, created with Pierson Browne and Joachim Desplande.

In its original open-world form, Minecraft offers players endless freedom to create, destroy, and explore fantasy realms limited only by their imagination. Yet in Hara, Browne and Desplande’s hacked version of the game, players face a starkly different scenario. Instead of an infinite sandbox, participants find themselves confined to a small, isolated island in the sky, surrounded on all sides by a vast, empty void. With minimal living space and finite resources, players must band together to survive and build a lasting society on this isolated island, passing hard-won knowledge from one generation to the next. Each person’s gameplay decisions collectively determines whether this microcosm world thrives or perishes over time.

By subverting Minecraft’s utopian promise, MindCraft confronts participants with important questions on sustainability, cooperation, and the delicate balance between creation and destruction. As they build an uncertain future for those who come next, players may gain insight into the enduring question: What legacy do we choose to leave?

 
 

In 2016, Hara directed and produced the award-winning machinima documentary web series Your Place or Minecraft? exploring the intersection of gaming and academia.

This episodic show transports viewers to the richly modded virtual realm known as the “mLab server” on Minecraft, owned by a game research center at Montreal’s Concordia University and inhabited by real-life students and professors from the center itself. As their academic lives and virtual adventures intertwine, the series captures the compelling stories that emerge. The seven episodes follow the players as they navigate collaborative projects, interpersonal conflicts, ambition, joy and frustrations, all within Minecraft’s possibility space.

Part documentary and part social drama, Your Place or Minecraft offers a window into the bonding and clashes that arise when academics build together in a virtual sandbox. The show spotlights not only their creations but also their real-world relationships as revived through the lens of gameplay. With insightful humor and immersive filming, the webseries encapsulates the joys, politics and collaborative challenges of scholarship.

 
 

We eagerly anticipate the insights and inspiration Ms. Hara will contribute as our first Game Artist-in-Residence at the 2024 Milan Machinima Festival.

Read more about Gina Hara’s work

EVENT: NOTHING IS TRUE. EVERYTHING IS PERMITTED (NOVEMBER 20 2023, BOLOGNA, ITALY)

Simone Santilli
Nothing is true. Everything is permitted.
Fotografia, videogioco e lavoro

In conversazione con Matteo Bittanti

evento gratuito con prenotazione

20 novembre 2023 ore 18:30

FOTO/INDUSTRIA_GAME

MAST.Auditorium

Via Speranza 42

Bologna, Italia

Gli ambienti digitali dei videogiochi sono siti di una intensa attività da parte di una crescente comunità di fotografi virtuali. Le loro macchine fotografiche sono fatte di codice e, oltre a produrre immagini, possono determinare la loro sopravvivenza fungendo da armi o mezzi con cui spostarsi nello spazio e nel tempo. Allo stesso tempo, la nostra quotidianità assomiglia sempre più a uno strano gioco nel quale le immagini sono le regole e i premi. Simone Santilli e Matteo Bittanti discuteranno del modo in cui videogioco e fotografia si intrecciano producendo estetiche e pratiche la cui portata va ben oltre l’ambito videoludico. Il ruolo dei due media è infatti centrale nella società contemporanea, dalla politica all’intrattenimento, dall’arte al marketing, dall’autorialità alla partecipazione, dalla crisi ambientale a quella dell’idea stessa di realtà.

Simone Santilli (1987) è un artista visivo, fondatore del duo The Cool Couple insieme a Niccolò Benetton, con il quale analizza i processi di produzione, circolazione e fruizione delle immagini. I progetti di TCC sono stati esposti presso istituzioni e festival italiani ed internazionali e nel 2020 il duo è stato tra i vincitori dell’ottava edizione di Italian Council. Simone Santilli è docente presso NABA, IED e MADE Program. Nel 2023 pubblica My Favourite Game. Fotografia e videogioco, uno studio sulle pratiche, l’estetica e le implicazioni dell’ibridazione tra medium videoludico e fotografico.

Artista, curatore e accademico, Matteo Bittanti studia gli aspetti culturali, sociali ed estetici delle tecnologie emergenti, in un approccio che abbraccia media studies, game studies e visual studies. Professore associato all’Università IULM di Milano, Bittanti ha svolto attività di insegnamento e ricerca anche presso la Stanford University e la University of California a Berkeley. Le sue ultime pubblicazioni includono le curatele Reset. Politica e videogiochi (2023), Game Over. Critica della ragione videoludica (2020), Fenomenologia di Grand Theft Auto (2019) e Giochi video. Performance, spettacolo, streaming (2018, insieme ad Enrico Gandolfi) per Mimesis Edizioni.

Simone Santilli
Nothing is true. Everything is permitted.
Photography, video game, and labor

In conversation with Matteo Bittanti

Free and open to the public (please RVSP)

November 20 2023 6:30 PM

FOTO/INDUSTRIA_GAME

MAST.Auditorium

Via Speranza 42

Bologna, Italy

The digital worlds of video games are sites of vigorous creativity for a growing community of virtual photographers. Their cameras are coded algorithms that determine their survival by serving as weapons or vehicles through space and time, in addition to producing images. Concurrently, our everyday life increasingly resembles a peculiar game where images are the rules and rewards. Simone Santilli and Matteo Bittanti will discuss the intertwining of video games and photography, generating aesthetics and practices that go beyond the gaming domain. The roles of both media are in fact pivotal in contemporary society, impacting politics, entertainment, art, marketing, authorship, participation, the environmental crisis, and the very notion of reality.

Simone Santilli (b. 1987) is a visual artist and founder of the artistic duo The Cool Couple with Niccolò Benetton, analyzing the processes of image production, circulation and consumption. TCC's projects have been showcased in Italian and international institutions and festivals, and in 2020 the duo was among the winners of the eighth Italian Council edition. Santilli lectures at NABA, IED and MADE Program. In 2023 he published My Favourite Game. Photography and Videogames, examining the practices, aesthetics and implications of the hybridization between video games and photography.

Artist, curator and scholar Matteo Bittanti investigates the cultural, social and aesthetic facets of emerging technologies, combining media studies, game studies and visual studies. An associate professor at IULM University in Milan, Bittanti has also taught and conducted research at Stanford University and at the University of California, Berkeley. His latest publications include the edited volume Reset. Politics and video games (2023), Game Over. Critique of Video Game Reason (2020), Phenomenology of Grand Theft Auto (2019) and Video Games. Performance, Spectacle, Streaming (2018, co-edited with Enrico Gandolfi) for Mimesis Edizioni.