Tokyo Digital Arts Museum Showed Ways Forward for Games, Maps and More
A few years ago, I had the chance to visit the NTT Intercommunication Centre in Tokyo. It’s a digital slash video art museum sponsored by Japan’s main telecom. In my mind, I have returned to that visit many times. In one room, there was an FM-radio dial where the visitor was the needle. By moving left and right, different radio stations would play on the speakers. By moving forward and back, the height of the visitor’s shadow controlled the volume of the audio. It was fascinating, but not as fascinating as the next room where a video game was the art piece. Echochrome by Sony for the Playstation Portable, which allows the player to make Escher-esque impossible figures as game maps. Games are popular among art museums, but this was an early example and the fact that it was presented as any work set it apart. In the next room again, was a thrilling map project – Authagraph, which uses triangles to solve the age old problem of projecting a globe (Earth) on a flat space (map). Three experiences that change my view of the world, all in the same afternoon. If you need an excuse to make a trip to Tokyo, let NTT-ICC be it!
