Flower

Software designers, thatgamecompany (TGC), have released a downloadable PlayStation 3 game known as Flower, which was featured today on Slate.

The mission of TGC "is to make commercial video games that communicate different emotional experiences the current video game market is not offering." In addition to Flower, they have a game known as flOw and one called Cloud

Flower is set in a gray world. The player starts inside a gray room where a single yellow flower is the only color. The player can use the motion sensitive controller to control gusts of wind and the soar of a single petal. As the petal moves through the environment, color follows and more petals gather.

Flower breaks the traditional video game format: there are no points, time limits or deaths. There are levels, in the form of simple challenges, but the point of this video game is not to achieve and finish, but to communicate an emotion.

TGC describes it as a "video game version of a poem" and Slate writer Chris Suellentrop says "it is the only game I've played that made me feel relaxed, peaceful, and happy."

Andy Goldsworthy

Andy Goldsworthy is a British artist who uses found natural objects to create temporary sculptures. He photographs his work as well, to create a permanent record. His art, some of which can be seen at his website, defies the boundary between the organic and the contrived. That is, we recognize his sculptures as works of art, but the natural media gives his works an almost accidental quality. The photographs of his work seem to capture a private moment in nature, in which art has formed itself. In Rivers and Tides, he says, "I don't think the earth needs me at all, but I do need it."




His philosophy as an artist is to capture the process of the natural world. He writes "I have become aware of raw nature is in a state of change and how that change is the key to understanding. I want my art to be sensitive and alert to changes..."

Strandbeests and simplicity

Theo Jansen is a Dutch artist creating kinetic sculptures powered only by the wind. He envisions herds of these strandbeests roaming the beaches with little or no help from man. This video, sponsored by BMW and TEDTalks, reveals some of his processes and the simple thinking behind such seemingly complicated constructs.



At one point in the video, Jansen discusses his reinvention of the wheel. "In fact, this is better than a wheel, because when you try to drive with your bicycle on the beach, you will notice it is very hard to do. The feet just step over the sand; the wheel has to touch everything in between."

Not to dive too deeply into the metaphorical potential of that statement, but Jansen's sculptures represent a world in which the solution is simpler than the problem at hand.