My critical thoughts from Down Under: March 2007

Finally, after having thought for nearly two years I did it. I went to bring the paper to change from a bachelor of Business into a bachelor of Social Sciences.

Just to be short, I was (long time ago) a secretary-accountant. I have done my studies in Switzerland more than .... 20 years ago so no credit possible. Oups, does not make me younger. I speak fluently and not fluently five languages so I really had all this plan of doing a bachelor of Business (logical with my accounting background), than an MBA, and than hopefully go back, after so many years, in the work force (if someone still wanted me!) as an International Manager for a big company like Nestle.

That was then, now it is different. I have done some business subjects and wanted to do one subject with no exam (I have what is called exam phobia, horrible and I am with everyone that suffer from the same phobia). So I did this course and enjoyed it so much that I followed another social studies course and have finally, after my grand age, ha ha, find the way I will follow: social studies. I know, I know it is not were people go but perhaps they should. Our world will always needs critical viewers. And anyway it is a cycle. In Swizerland many were doing IT studies and of course what should have happened happened. Not enough job for too many applicant. So in some years there will be a shortage of social sciences employeeS and here I will be. Hopefully someone or an entreprise will think I am worth it. Wish me good luck.

Still planning to apply to Nestle, Cadbury, or Japanese companies (love Japan, lived there for four years, will go back anydays) so follow this blog, in some years, I will perhaps have a job in one of those companies.

So good luck to everyone doing the same than I am, changing your life around as it goes.

Video Games are still considered nowadays as coming from a low or middle class, where only introverted or weird people plays it, and a pure object of consumption for the popular masses. This despite of the enormous popularity and impressive advance as much on technology level as on the quality level of these games. Why is it that still in 2007, many still have difficulties in calling video game a form of art?

Before being able to answer this question it is necessary to be able to answer the question “what is art?” I like the definition of wikipedia, which define art as being "a term used to describe a particular type of creative production generated by a human being, and the term implies in general a certain degree of aesthetic value."

Photography, cinema, sculpture, painting, music are subjects which have already acquired the recognition to be a form of art. Nowadays, the video game is still not recognised as such in a wide number of countries. The video games include several kinds of art already recognised universally like the music, the drawing or painting, the film. It does include each one of these fields and with each new game produced these fields grow towards new limits.

As we can read in
http://www.afjv.com/press0609/060914_discours_jeux_video_ministre_culture.htm "when the cinema was invented, more than one century ago, it was the toys of the technicians or a entertainment of popular fair". Few people would, at the time, have been able to suppose that the cinema would become the giant that it is currently. We can compare video games as the cinema of its time. We can appreciate the quality of the current games but the video games are still considered as being an entertainment of the popular class. This perhaps precisely because million of people around the world play each days video games and that it is though not a form of art reserved to only one particular class – the high society.

It seems to me that still nowadays the human being recognise something like art only if this object has been recognised by the high society. The video games is still considered like being for popular masses so this high society is not yet ready to consider the video game as they should, as a work of art. There are several kinds of art and each person having a different taste, one will not have the same vision of art than another. I adore what Miro does (below is the photograph of the print I have home) but I do not like at all the modern art of Picasso. This opinion is not what many thinks considering the astronomical prices reached by large numbers of Picasso’s modern painting.

Miro Print - Terra Ilaurada 1923-24

Picasso modern art

If we decipher the video games, we notice that they include several fields of art: visual art, musical art, the art of the cinema but also the art of technology. Nowadays a majority of video games have an extraordinary quality of drawing, of story, of music that sometimes make us forget it is a game and not a cinema film. Another reason to the difficulty in accepting the video game as an art could be that as several different field of art (visual, musical, cinematography, technique) a part of the video games it is difficult to classify them.

Film, painting, story, technology?
All together?

However, we of course mainly speak on this subject for Australia and we can appreciate to see that in France, on March 13th, 2006, three personalities creating video games, Michel Ancel, Frédérick Raynal and Shigeru Miyamoto, have been recognised by the Republic and received the medaille des chevaliers (Knight) in the order of arts and the letters. On March 13th, 2007, Antoine the Villette, creator and businessman in the field of video play (Darkworks) also received the medaille so much desired
(http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/artsetlettres/).

These recognitions show that finally, the video games are starting, with difficulties, to be recognised as being a reel field of art. One can thus ask the following question: how is it that Australia cannot also acknowledge officially the talent of a great number of authors of video games. It is possible that Australia still seeks in 2007 the recognition of the high society or the society that hold the money before telling high and strong that a object is a piece of art. For my part, I think that despite the fact that the video game are considered as being for the popular masses, they are, without any doubt, a new form of art of the 21eme century which will surely in a few years equal, if it is not surpass, the cinema fame. The video games open new borders on the level of the creativity for many people working in the production of plays videos and we will surely in a near future look backward and see that it was a mistake not to recognise a wide number of video games as a piece of art.

Michel Ancel, Frédérick Raynal, Shigeru Miyamoto
chevaliers des arts et lettres

Antoine Villette - studio Darkworks
chevalier des arts et lettres

LINKS
Agence francaise pour le jeu video, http://www.afjv.com/press0603/060313_createurs_jeux_video_decores.htm

Darkworks.com, http://www.darkworks.com/

Frédérick Raynal divers websites
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/FrÃ©dÃ©rick_Raynal
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/FrÃ©dÃ©rick_Raynal
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/FrÃ©dÃ©rick_Raynal

La vie numerique.com, http://www.lavienumerique.com/Shigeru-Miyamoto,-Michel-Ancel-et-Frederick-Raynal-couronnes-par-RDDV_a2115.html

Michel Ancel divers websites
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Ancel
http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=60715

Every video game, picture, http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=60715

Republique francaise, site officiel Ordre des Arts et Lettres, http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/artsetlettres/

Shigeru Miyamoto divers websites
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shigeru_Miyamoto
http://www.miyamotoshrine.com/
http://www.time.com/time/asia/2006/heroes/bl_miyamoto.html
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/02/14/miyamoto.script/index.html

Wikipedia, Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevalier_des_Arts_et_des_Lettres

Traduction francaise

Les jeux video sont toujours consideres de nos jours comme venant d’un milieu de basse classe, ou seulement des gens introvertis ou bizarres y jouent, et un pure objet de consommation pour les masses populaires. Ceci malgre l’enorme popularite et l’avance impressionnante tant au niveau de la technologie mais aussi au niveau de la qualite de ces jeux. Pourquoi se fait-il qu’encore en 2007, beaucoup aient des difficultes de parler de jeux video en tant qu’art?

Avant de pouvoir repondre a cette question il faut deja pouvoir repondre a la question qu’est-ce que l’art. J’apprecie la definition de wikipedia qui defini l’art comme etant “un terme utilise pour decrire un type particulier de production creative generee par un etre human, et le terme implique en general un certain degre de valeur esthetique.”

La photographie, le cinema, la sculpture, la peinture, la musique sont des sujets qui ont acquis la reconnaissance d’etre une forme d’art. De nos jours, le jeux video n’est toujours pas reconnu comme tel dans encore un grand nombre de pays. Les jeux videos incluent plusieurs sortes d’art deja reconnus mondialement comme la musique, le dessin ou la peinture, le film. Les jeux video incluent chacun de ses domaines et avec chaque nouveau jeu qui se fait ces domaines sont pousses vers de nouvelles limites.

Comme on peut le lire dans http://www.afjv.com/press0609/060914_discours_jeux_video_ministre_culture.htm, “ quand le cinema fut invente, il y a plus d’un siecle, c’etait le jouet des techniciens ou un divertissement de foire populaire”. Peu de gens aurait a l’epoque pu supposer que le cinema deviendrait le geant qu’il est actuellement. Nous pouvons voir le jeux video comme etant le cinema de l’epoque. Nous pouvons apprecier la qualite des jeux actuels et le jeux video est toujours considere comme etant un divertissement de la classe populaire. Ceci peut-etre du fait que justement des millions de gens jouent chaque jours et cela n’est donc pas une forme d’art reservee a une seule classe particuliere soit la haute societe.

Il me semble qu’encore de nos jours l’etre humain ne reconnait quelque chose comme art que si cet objet a ete reconnu par la haute societe. Le jeu video etant toujours considere comme etant populaire, cette societe n’est pas prete a reconnaitre les jeux videos a leur juste valeur, en tant qu’oeuvre d’art. Il y a plusieurs sortes d’art et chaque personne ayant un gout different chacun n’aura pas la meme vision de l’art. J’adore ce que fait Miro (ci-dessous est la photo du print que j’ai a la maison) mais je n’aime pas du tout l’art moderne de Picasso. Cet avis n’est pas partage par tout le monde vu le prix astronomique atteint par un grande nombre de tableaux modernes de Picasso.

Si l’on decripte les jeux videos, on remarque qu’ils comprennent plusieurs domaines d’art: l’art visuel, l’art musical, l’art du cinema mais aussi l’art de la technologie. Une grande majorite de jeux video de nos jours ont une qualite extraordinaire de dessin, d’histoire, de musique quitte a parfois nous faire oublier qu’il s’agit d’un jeu et nom d’un film de cinema. Une autre raison a la difficulte d’accepter les jeux video en tant qu’art pourrait etre qu’etant donne que les jeux videos sont formes de plusieurs domaines d’art (visuel, musical, cinematographie, technique) il est difficile pour beaucoup d’arriver a les classer.

Cependant, nous parlons bien sur de ce sujet pour l’Australie principalement et nous pouvons apprecier de voir qu’en France, le 13 mars 2006, trois personnalites creatrices de jeux video, Michel Ancel, Frédérick Raynal et Shigeru Miyamoto, ont ete reconnues par la republique et ont recu la medaille de Chevalier dans l’ordre des arts et des lettres. Le 13 mars 2007, Antoine Villette, createur et entrepreneur dans le domaine de jeu video (Darkworks) a lui aussi recu la medaille tant convoitee.

Cela montre donc que enfin, les jeux videos commencent, avec difficultes, a etre reconnu comme etant un reel domaine d’art. On peut donc se poser la question suivante: comment se fait-il que l’Australie ne puisse pas elle aussi reconnaitre officiellement le talent d’un grand nombre d’auteurs de jeu video. Est-il possible que l’Australie recherche encore en 2007 la reconnaissance premiere de la societe de l’argent avant de decreter haut et fort qu’une chose est une oeuvre d’art. Pour ma part, je pense que malgre le fait que les jeux video sont considere comme etant pour les masses populaires, il s’agit sans aucun doute d’un nouvelle forme d’art du 21eme siecle qui va surement egaler, si ce n’est depasser, la renommee du cinema d’ici quelques annees. Les jeux video ouvrent de nouvelles frontieres au niveau de la creativite pour de nombreuses personnes travaillant dans la production de jeux videos et nous regarderons la passe dans une proche future et verrons l'erreur de ne pas avoir reconnu plus tot un grand nombre de jeu video comme une oeuvre d'art.