Feature Article
The most wonderful thing about art is that no one truly knows what art is. Its creative expression and general free nature means that anything one makes “creatively” is art. This begins to raise the question of where it ends. Video games have recently garnered respect as art when the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art included video games in its museum. This is a new development and a great way to show that art is formless. Video games were always portrayed in a negative light, as if always conflicting with education and the arts. One has to wonder if video games are even art, let alone if they belong in museums. Video games are a valid form of art because of the various parallels one can draw between video games and other forms of art.
The first question people might come up with is whether video games are even art. Art has no true definition and cannot be quantified. The line has to be drawn somewhere and I think people have unfairly drawn the line at video games. But people with artistic intent make video games. People who wish to express themselves and bring their inner dreams and visions come to life. Each video game has its own unique style that separates it from the others, just as paintings do. I think the only qualification necessary to be art is to be made with creative passion. I think modern art is a good example because it shows something does not have to be pretty in order to be considered art. There are some very strange modern art paintings that may or may not make sense to us and may or may not be visually appealing. But those pieces of modern art are still art because they express something in some form. Not every piece of art has to be a painting or a conventional sculpture. I remember seeing a mop and a bucket sculpture at the Brooklyn Museum being called art. As such when a video game developer painstakingly converts numerous binary codes into a picture and then video, I do not understand how one cannot call it art. Video games also create a narrative and take you to places. Just one can get lost in the beauty and complexity of a painting, the same can happen in a video game. For example, in a video game where you drive a car, there is a narrative that takes you from point A to B. It is that personal imagination which makes a video game experience similar to seeing a painting. Art is for the open minds that can appreciate the artistic appeal of it, not narrowly dismiss it because it unconventional.
The Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art has fourteen video games and one console on display. It focuses on the old games to really show the history behind video game development just as museums show a lot of ancient paintings. It really shows how art has evolved and video games have come very far from their humble origins. Each video game at the MOMA has a story as well. Taito’s Space Invaders for example was immensely popular in Japan, so much so that Japan had a shortage of 100-yen coins. It then hit stateside and conquered the arcade industry. It was like a famous painting that spurred a revolution in art. More recent games at the MOMA like Mojang’s Minecraft show the evolution of gaming. It is still very simple and has “retro” graphics but nonetheless shows innovation in the video game scene. It improves upon the simple 2-D games of the past. It again shows that video games are art because art changes, it evolves and reinvents itself. Sometimes it looks back to older styles like how Minecraft has this classic feel. Video games have a long established history and should thus be included.
Critics of video games being considered art sight various reasons. For one, video games cannot be looked at and enjoyed the same way a painting or sculpture can. Video games do not fall into the norm according to viewpoints like this. But the thing is though is that video games can still be looked at and enjoyed. It may not be the same as a painting, but one can still look at the graphics and the gameplay to see how expressive video games really are. Another criticism would be the lack of the artist. If there is no artist, then there is no art. But the problem with that criticism is that someone made that game, which means that there is an artist. In video games, several people work on it. If multiple painters worked on a painting it is still art. The same applies with videogames. But he biggest criticism I have seen is that videogames are not personal visions of life. People say that a video game interacts with the player to create the world while art is created solely by the artist. I disagree with this because the game itself was still made by the designers, who are the artists. A lot of designers project their visions into games, as game worlds are inspired by the things that designers see. Their imaginations shape the world in the game just as a painter’s imagination envisions the painting. The criticisms for video games not being art are too rigid and base the argument too much on semantics and technicalities.
The video games at the Metropolitan Museum are here to stay. It is a step up to include it in the realm of art. With this development, I feel people will be more open to different forms of art, instead of limiting it to paintings and sculptures. The boundaries need to be pushed to maximize the chance for great art. The most celebrated forms of art were not accepted at some point but had to go through a process of consideration until they were validated as art. Expressing oneself is not wrong, so doing it in one medium versus another one does not disqualify one’s work from being considered art.
Works Cited
Galoway, Paul. “VIDEO GAMES: SEVEN MORE BUILDING BLOCKS IN MoMA’S COLLECTION.” InsideOut. MoMA, 28 June 2013. Web. 20 Nov. 2013.
Jones, Jonathan. “Sorry MoMA, Video Games Are Not Art.” The Guardian. The Guardian, 30 Nov. 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
Maeda, John. “Videogames Do Belong in the Museum of Modern Art.” Wired.com. Conde Nast Digital, 02 Dec. 0012. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
