Contact: Tamika Bonneau
Detroit Art Works
(810) 622 0106.
[LINK: mailto:tamika@detroitartworks.org] tamika@detroitartworks.org
ARTIST CREATES NEW STREET GAME "CARRY ME BACK" FOR COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY GAME SHOW.
INTERACTIVE GAME PLAYS WITH LIFE-SIZE PIECES ON THE SIDEWALKS OF NEW YORK
New York City, New York – (Date) – On May 14, 2011, three New Yorkers
from the distant and recent past will be returning to the streets of
Manhattan to visit their old haunts in a new game called "CARRY ME
BACK" designed by artist Jim Pallas.
America's answer to
Mozart,Thelonious Monk, Saul Steinberg, who a drew "View of the
World as Seen From 9th Avenue," and a Lenni Lenape, a woman of
the Native American tribe that saw Giovanni da Verrazano sail along the
coast in 1524,are all board pieces in a game that will be played out in
the streets of New York.
Columbia University asked Jim
Pallas, a pioneer of electronic art, to design a game that would take
the action out of the University’s Macy Gallery and onto the city's
streets. The project is a part of Game Show NYC, an exhibit of
artist-designed games.
Mr. Pallas came up with
an ingenious plan for abandoning light-weight, life size plywood
cut-out portraits of these historic figures in public places while
motivating passers-by to pick them up and carry them to various
destinations that would hold special meaning for each of the
figures.
For instance, one of the
destinations that Thelonius Monk is expected to visit is his former
residence on the west side. Mr. Steinberg will visit one of his
inspirational monuments, the Statue of Liberty, and the Lenape woman
will spend some quiet time in Chelsea Park near the Lenape Edible
Garden downtown.
What would motivate strangers to
carry these artworks to these places, then leave them there for someone
else to find and carry to another destination?
Money. By
doing so, they will qualify for a share in any profits earned from
theindividual artworks when and if it's sold.
How
will people who want to participate in this peripatetic game find one
of these artworks in the vastness of the city? Each is equipped
with a device that reveals its location on a map placed on a
public web page (jpallas.com/carrymeback). On this page, anyone
can watch the movement
of the pieces as they are carried and
left at one of their destinations. Anyone can be a
player/participant by going to the destination and carrying the piece
to another destination.
"I know it
sounds crazy," says Pallas, a seventy-year-old artist who has exhibited
internationally. "It doesn't seem like it would work, but I've been
making and abandoning these "hitch hikers"since 1981.
In 2006, I set five of them out, heading for various destinations in
the Silicon Valley.
One was set out on the east coast at
M.I.T. Four made it to their destinations in San Jose and are at
the Tech Museum there. One went missing near a pig farm in Iowa."
Pallas says he creates these ‘hitch hikers’ for the
stories they generate. "People are encouraged to take them
on little adventures. They have some fun and put them in amusing
situations. Send me emails and photos which I post"
Monk,
Steinberg and Lenni will be set out somewhere in Manhattan on May
14, and their travels can be tracked on the web page,
jpallas.com/carrymeback
The _Game Show NYC_ exhibit
opens May 16 and runs until June 3, at the Macy Gallery at Columbia
University’s Teacher’s College, in conjunction with "Creativity, Play,
and the Imagination across Disciplines", a three-day conference on
games at Columbia University. The exhibition will include a gallery
reception on May 27.
For more info contact Tamika Bonneau at (810) 622 0106. [LINK: mailto:tamika@detroitartworks.org]
tamika@detroitartworks.org
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Saul Steinberg Hitchhiker