voidspace dispatches, volume 9: Subversion, technology, and finding your silly
interactive arts
For those of us who have the luxury of a little time off, and comfortable warm homes to spend it in, twixt-mas, the period between Christmas and New Year, is a good time to hunker down, rest and rejuvenate. It can be a good time to explore facets of our creativity that can get lost in the daily grind.
With this in mind, this week’s dispatches focus on creative games you can try at home. From the surprising to the irreverent, to the extremely silly, we guarantee these games will help you get the fresh perspective that could spark something new.
Send what you come up with to voidspacezine@gmail.com: we promise to read everything, and share our favourites.
Food for thought remains on the menu as we speak to Tom Dale and John Ross about the intersection between dance and technology, and what the future may hold for this particular artform.
2024 is shaping up to be exciting, with new performances from companies including Coney, Protein Dance and the team behind Parabolic Theatre appearing in our listings section, alongside our very own voidspace live featuring friends of the void old and new.
In the meantime, make a cup of tea, get yourself comfortable, and enjoy this week’s dispatches at your own twixt-mas pace.
voidspace at home
interactive arts to experience at your own pace
voidspace in conversation: Tom Dale and John Ross
We talk to the choreographer and company founder Tom Dale, and Punchdrunk alum and multidisciplinary performer John Ross.
Read about about their pioneering experiments with interactivity and multimedia dance projects, the impact of technology on this creative space, and the importance of staying true to your creative vision.
Find more voidspace conversations here
Blackout poetry creator by Tristan Onek
Put the text of your choice (your own words, or someone else’s into the box, and this tool will create a blackout poem from it.
Try different sources and refresh your results to find new, often surprisingly poignant, takes on familiar texts
First published in the voidspace in January 2022
See what voidspace writers have created using this tool
Surrealist definition generator (from Language is a Virus)
Creates, at random, surreal definitions of everyday words
Example: “Anger: any echinoderm of the class Asteroidea, having the body radially arranged, usually in the form of a star, with five or more rays or arms radiating from a central disk; asteroid.”
Use your new definition to make something: a story, a poem, a picture, a dance, a game.
Poetry Gyroscope (from Language is a Virus)
Enter replacement words and watch the poetry gyroscope dynamically evolve the poems of Pound, cummings, Whitman, Silverstein & Frost
Try replacing every suggested word with “void”, “baked beans”, or something even more juvenile
voidspace live 2024 is coming! A one day festival of interactive arts in London, Spring 2024, with interactive performances, workshops, games and more.
Click below to find out more about the festival, and how you can be a part of making it happen (and bag priority booking or exclusive merch, or just be a friend of the void 🖤).
The voidspace is free to read, and we do not charge submission fees. We need help to run the festival fairly, while keeping tickets affordable.
If you enjoy reading this newsletter, or find it useful, please consider supporting us, if you can.
voidspace explores
interactive arts listings
This week
AI: Who’s Looking After Me? - an exhibition featuring interactive works from Blast Theory, Fast Familiar and more, taking a questioning and playful look at the ways artificial intelligence is already shaping so many areas of our lives - from our healthcare and justice systems to how we look after our pets.
Science Gallery, London
3 - 20 January 2024
Poetry Pharmacy - pop-up poetry dispensary. The best medicine.
Lush Studio, Soho, London
Until 6 January 2023
Hammam by Anu Productions - In an entirely re-imagined Peacock Theatre in the heart of Dublin, audiences will traverse the depths of the destroyed buildings of O’Connell Street to explore one of the most contentious elements of the Republic of Ireland’s past and its deeply enduring legacy in the present.
Abbey Theatre, Dublin
Until 6 January 2024
Artic Lumina: Winter in Motion - audio-visual installation transforming the space into an immersive winter utopia
ME London
Until 15 January 2024
The Ministry of Time Travel, by Coney - a series of adventures created at The National Archives for young people & families. Audiences are welcomed to the world of The Ministry of Time Travel (MOTT), a secret organisation based at the heart of The National Archives, to use the evidence from the past available there, to safeguard time itself
Online or at The National Archives
Ongoing
Bubble Planet - multisensory, interactive exhibition themed around bubbles
Wembley, London
Ongoing
TIME OUT .12 - Timebased and Interactive Media meets Ars Eletronica - Exhibition of diverse interactive artistic media works
Ars Electronica Centre, Linz, Austria
Ongoing
Digital Art Murals Unwired Studio / Bedford Creative Arts - series of AR murals inviting players to launch airships, fly planes and break into a bank vault and learn more about local Bedford history.
Bedford High Street (scan QR codes to play)
Ongoing
Next week
Lennox Mutual by Candlehouse Collective - Welcome to Lennox Mutual: a Life En-surance company, here to help you make the most of the time you have. We offer policies – to get yours, all you have to do is make an appointment.
For more information, book a one-on-one phone session. Our live representatives are trained to make you feel, make you think, and of course, make you smile. You’ve never experienced service like ours.
Online
5 January 2024 - 3 March 2024
January 2024
Super Normal Extra Natural by Requart and Rosenburg - A seemingly normal day starts to merge with a world of angels and demons, hope and pain, as dancers and singers are joined by Croydon locals to take over Whitgift Shopping Centre. Using headphones to connect to the soundtrack, audiences become a part of a surreal world that blurs the boundaries between reality and performance.
Whitgift Shopping Centre, Croydon
12 - 14 January 2024
Uli AP: Alien AI - an immersive, interactive performance and disruptive installation. Visitors experience a diverse range of interactions with the Alien AI mediated by real-time AI, interaction with a performer, live responsive sound and travelling VR headsets.
The Ugly Duck, London
13-14 January 2024
A Magic Trick by Coney - A gentle yet impactful piece of play, that might help spark a small positive change in your life.
Online
Thursday 25 January 2024
Monday 29 January 2024
Later 2024
May Contain Food: May Contain You - Protein Dance - Protein transforms a local venue into a musical dining experience! Take a seat at decorated tables and watch, savour and digest the playful mix of dance, theatre and songs that unfolds around you.
Ashburton Arts Centre - 23 February 2024
Landmark Arts Centre, Teddington - 24 February 2024
Posh Club, Crawley (Extract only) - 27 February 2024
Blackwood Miners Institute, Caerphilly - 28 February 2024
AMATA, Falmouth - 9 March 2024
SpArc Theatre, Bishop’s castle - 17 March 2024
Norden Farm, Maidenhead - 27 March 2024
Memorial Hall - Letterston (Wales) - 29 March 2024
Cardigan (Wales) - 30 March 2024
Woolwich Works, London - 10 - 13 April 2024
SUB:VERSION / SURGE by Tom Dale Company - genre busting immersive / interactive dance
Nottingham Lakeside Arts - 27 February 2024
Bath Spa University - 29 February 2024
Barnesley Civic Theatre - 22 March 2024
Dance City, Newcastle - 2 May 2024
Curve, Leicester - 15 May 2024
Gingerline: Homecoming - interactive dining theatre, theme TBA
London
6 March - 28 April 2024
Areas Of Effect: Planar Systems, Critical Roles, and Gaming Imaginaries - One-day symposium on Tabletop Role Playing Games (TTRPGs) with live game sessions. TTRPG designers, writers and artists address the hopes currently instilled in Tabletop Role Playing Games as a transformative activity
Arebyte Gallery, London
9 March 2024
Bridge Command - ever wanted to fly your own spaceship? Now’s your chance. From the creative team behind Parabolic Theatre
London
From 27 March 2024
Kiss, Marry, Kill, Dante or Die - site specific theatre re-imagining the first same-sex wedding in a UK prison
London - 16-26 April 2024
Reading - 30 April - 4 May 2024
Manchester - 10 May - 12 May
A.MAZE / Berlin - annual international arthouse games and playful media festival
Berlin
8 - 11 May 2024
New Media Writing Prize, annual Unconference. Theme: Inclusivity in digital literature - panels, workshops, hackathons, digital exhibits and more
14 - 15 May 2024
Online
The Locksmith’s Dream - highly immersive and interactive luxury 24 hour experience set in a 17th century manor house
Treowen House, Wales
Ongoing: 2024/25
voidspace live 2024 is coming! A one day festival of interactive arts in London, Spring 2024, with interactive performances, workshops, games and more.
Click below to find out more about the festival, and how you can be a part of making it happen (and bag priority booking or exclusive merch, or just be a friend of void 🖤).
The voidspace is free to read, and we do not charge submission fees. We need help to run the festival fairly, while keeping tickets affordable.
If you enjoy reading this newsletter, or find it useful, please consider supporting us, if you can.
voidspace writes
create interactive art
voidspace 9: General call for interactive fiction, poetry, anything else you can think of.
Can be as simple as a text doc, or as complex as you like, it just has to give your reader agency. Find resources here or check out past issues for inspiration.
Subs close 7 January 2024
A.MAZE: - Submit your game / interactive theatre piece / other playful media for exhibition and potential award selection by the festival committee
Subs close 31 January 2024
Cybernetic Forests: Models for making distance:
Models For Making Distance is a print zine gathering a multiplicity of manifestos, writing and instructions for art that confounds, confuses and misuses algorithmic systems for the pleasure of human observers or actors. It is a playful but earnest bid for placing distance between ourselves and the tools designed to measure us.
ARRG! (the Algorithmic Resistance Research Group) aims to create a low-cost paper publication gathering a variety of authors, activists and artists who navigate AI systems from a position of resistance. We are looking for those willing to contribute their work for documentation in this analog pamphlet among like-minded critics and digital malcontents.
Subs close: 1 March 2024
Annual online festival celebrating new interactive fiction
Intent to enter can be submitted until 1 March 2024
voidspace live 2024: special callout
Games, interactive fiction or other interactive work that would work well in a cafe setting to be exhibited at voidspace live
Email voidspacezine@gmail.com
Subs close 31 March 2024
Plotopolis - a new literary journal, publishing interactive fiction on chat platforms.
Subs: ongoing. One story published per quarter.
Other Interactive Fiction competitions and jams
Check out IF Wiki for a comprehensive and up to date list of IF comps and jams
Ongoing
Got an interactive event, game, or publication to share? Email us at voidspacezine@gmail.com to be included in future dispatches.