SPIEL! Games as Critical Practice
Everybody plays games, is fascinated by games and presses PLAY buttons dozens of times each day. In all forms, games dominate our leisure time and distract us from reality. But game theory also shapes political strategies and new rules for society. How do we become media-competent gamers, and not just pawns of gamification?
The international festival SPIEL! Games as Critical Practice explores the creative power in games. At the end of January 2023, the Hochschule für Musik FHNW in Basel will be hosting concerts, lectures, performances, and discussions to playfully and critically illuminate social, technological, and aesthetic issues based on music – in scientific lectures as well as in a real world audio game, in a rave séance, and in a gambling den.
Many playful processes, including chance, performance, collaboration, and improvisation, are closely related to musical practice. Conversely, playfulness, gamification, and social design are increasingly shaping music education work.
The multilayered concept of play initiates productive networks of art and education, teaching and research, technical innovation and socially critical discourse.
Guest in the Foyer Public of Theater Basel
Essential potentials of a game only become recognizable when playing! During the extended weekend SPIEL! Games as Critical Practice the game subject becomes the mode of its mediation. A large part of the events will take place in the public space, the Foyer Public of the Theater Basel. Lectures and discussion forums interact with music performances, artistic interventions, installations and participatory formats.
In addition to renowned international guests from the fields of music, design and research, the following local partners and with them many pupils and students are actively involved (selection): Hochschule für Musik FHNW (including Institute Jazz, Electronic Studio or Music and Movement), Musikschule, Institut Digitale Kommunikations-Umgebungen IDCE (FHNW), Hochschule für Angewandte Psychologie (FHNW), Hochschule für Technik (FHNW), Pädagogische Hochschule (FHNW), Vera Oeri Bibliothek, Philosophisches Seminar, Musikwissenschaftliches Seminar und Zentrum Gender Studies (Universität Basel), Theater Basel.
Some Highlights from the Program:
- Keynote by the renowned American game designer Mary Flanagan
- Real World Audio Game for young and old on the Theaterplatz
- Public "Spielhölle" (Gambling den) with numerous computer games and slot machines in the old ticket office of Theater Basel
- ToyLab with new musical toys
- Participative Rave Séance over several hours at the Jazzcampus
- Late night concert of the band Ministry of Bad Decisions at the Hochschule für Musik
International Guests:
Dicky Bahto (USA), Maja Bosnić (SRB), Clément Canonne (F), Marko Ciciliani (A), Yaron Deutsch (ISR), Mary Flanagan (USA), Melanie Fritsch (D), Bernhard Lang (A), Anna Longo (F), Barbara Lüneburg (A), Sarah Nemtsov (D), Goni Peles (ISR), Stefan Prins (D), Ensemble Recherche (D), Sébastien Roux (F), James Saunders (UK), Sarah Maria Sun (D), Andrew N. Walsh (D), Agata Zubel (PL).
