Inara Pey has already made a superb blog post about Obedience in Second Life, so I will try and refrain from covering all of the same ground, but it’s inevitable that there will be some crossover.
Obedience is An Installation in 15 Rooms by Saskia Boddeke & Peter Greenaway at the Jewish Museum in Berlin. The exhibit started on May 22nd and will be running until September 13th.
Saskia Boddeke is also known as Rose Borchovski in Second Life, whereas Peter Greenaway is a British Film director of films such as The Belly of an Architect and The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover amongst many others. Peter Greenaway has also been known to use Second Life.
Now if you’re wondering what an exhibit at the Jewish Museum in Berlin has to do with Second Life, it’s because there’s also a Second Life version of the exhibit running at LEA1 in Second Life which has been brought to life thanks to the fine work of Bryn Oh and Jo Ellsmere.
Bryn Oh in a blog post about Obedience explains that Obedience is :
A hybrid art exhibition showing both at the Jüdisches Museum in Berlin as well as in the virtual environment of Second Life. It will run until September 13th 2015 in both our virtual world on LEA 1 and at the Museum. The virtual space, as seen in the trailer, was created by myself and Jo Ellsmere. Jo’s work is the wonderful bot performances you will find in the God room towards the end. The immersive space we have created is being shown on monitors within the Museum thus allowing the guests to navigate the 3D space as part of the overall Museum installation which was the creation of Saskia Boddeke and European director Peter Greenaway.
This is quite a coup for virtual world art and a great example of how virtual worlds are far more than merely platforms for people to chat or play games, there’s something very immersive and very exciting about a concept such as this. We also get to see how creative Second Life can be as a platform for not only displaying art, but also for storytelling via a 3d environment because Obedience certainly has a story to tell :
The story of forefather Abraham, who is willing to obey God’s command and sacrifice his son, is one of the most puzzling passages of the Bible. In the three monotheistic religions, it is among the most significant and most popular stories and among the first that were ever depicted. The text that is handed down in Judaism as the “Binding of Isaac” to this day still raises questions that are answered differently by the three religions.
British film director Peter Greenaway and multimedia artist Saskia Boddeke understand the sacrifice of Isaac as a human drama. Which is stronger – God’s command or the love of a father? And where can the modern subject be found between the priorities of obedience and trust?
Taking these questions as their starting point, Boddeke and Greenaway have developed a coherent artistic scenario that approaches the biblical narrative subjectively, deconstructs it, and refocuses the constituent parts to create an emotionally tangible scenario.
An important point to note is that you should pay attention on arrival to the information posters regarding how to set your windlight settings to maximise your experience. They are there for a very good reason and will certainly help you enjoy the exhibit more.
Another point to note is that I’m not part of the exhibit, but I couldn’t resist taking a selfie whilst I was there!
The Second Life exhibit, like the exhibit at the Jewish Museum in Berlin, will be running until September 13th, so there’s plenty of time to experience this exhibit, and then go back and experience it again.
Bryn Oh has also produced a video trailer of the exhibit, there’s also a video trailer on the Jewish Museum’s web page for this exhibit.
This is powerful stuff and well worth a visit.
SLURL To Obedience : http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/LEA1/37/214/125