flop

2012

Exhibited in medium_massage 2.0 curated by Year01.com/Michael Alstad with Cheryl Sourkes, Jeremy Bailey, Mouchette, Kd Thornton, Kate Armstrong, David Jhave Johnson, Rafaël Rozendaal, Donna Szoke

Flop is a two part installation consisting of a game and a somewhat obscurely installed projected floppydisk projection inside an HVAC tube in the ceiling. Flop extends the game play experience into the physical gallery space. The game consists mostly of musings about some lost item probably a floppy disk. The player moves about a floppy disk while searching through other floppy disks, never really sure what they're searching for. The game is an endless loop.

Flop came about as a result of receiving a delivery of a massive archive of floppy disks from a previous employer who thought that the disks were mine. I began archiving the floppies, examining their contents. I also began taking inventory of my own archives and how massive they had become over the years. In essence, my own failures of organization of media and information (which were not unusual) became a poetic place from which I thought a new work could emerge/pivot from.

Flop has an intro screen like conventional games but it is essentially a never ending loop. The various screens have collisions set up with the main sprite – which is dragged around the screen hovering over other floppy disks. As the collisions happen, there are pre-determined musings about searching for something – the elusive floppy – that seems impossible to find. The goal of the game is basically a searching process – for something that seems futile. However, situated within the gallery there is a “ghost” floppy hiding inside a vent as a projection. The projection references some early video art in its form.

where did i leave it?
where could it be?
why can't i find it?
is it even in here?
where did i put that file?
Where did i put it?
How could I have lost it?
why didn't I label them?
Why can't I find them?
where is it?
where can it be?
I think I remember it being here somewhere...
It has to be here somewhere...
Did someone take it?
How will I ever find it?
oh there, is that it?
I can't seem to find it anywhere

Flop from Myfanwy Ashmore on Vimeo.