GAME 2 - THE RIVER ORACLE

RESEARCH IMAGES ____THE GAME PLAY

In collaboration with Moving Forest and furtherfield

Wednesday 04 July 2012, 9-11am Meet at furtherfield

Cybernetic systems and game theory are about anticipating and influencing human behaviour using algorithmic code, databases, social media etc - the industries of data-mining, data profiling and data protection can be said to be the new 'magic' by which biopolitical control of our bodies and identities is maintained.

3 Keys - The River Oracle with The Hexists is a game of chance and divination in association with The Moving Forest, Act 0. It attempts to invoke the relationship between the divinatory functions of our contemporary 'influencing machines' (cybernetic systems and game theory using data-mining, data profiling and data protection) and traditional magical ones, creating new machines in the process. Using tools such as cards, dowsing, stick throwing to interpret phenomena in the landscape, historical and current, 'readings' can be cast, allowing associative action, language and thought to determine what might happen in the future, to create a path, an artwork.

In 3 Keys (version 3), participants will follow the Hackney Brook, an old subterranean river that begins near Finsbury Park and ends up in the River Lea near the site of the Olympics, using different exercises to interpret the landscape and cast readings. We will 'mark' the route along the way with objects and stories and other inscriptions. The river is the oracle and we are the transmisson. The documentation and divination tools will be made available for display in the exhibition after the event.