Is Ebert Right? Games as Art
Posted on Apr 21, 2010 | 2 comments
Penny Arcade, the clown princes of the game commentary, brought my attention to a recent article by Roger Ebert, which is a response to his earlier conversation with Clive Barker and a TED video by Kellee Santiago. Although I agree whole heartedly with Gabe and Tycho, Roger Ebert does have some good points.
Roger Ebert vs. Games
Roger Ebert is steadfast in his insistence that Games are not Art, but his reasons for this are less then rigorous. He seems to have many things that qualify a work as art. He even qualifies “trash” film as “not great art”:
I treasure escapism in the movies. I tirelessly quote Pauline Kael: The movies are so rarely great art, that if we cannot appreciate great trash, we have no reason to go. I admired “Spiderman II,” “Superman,” and many of the “Star Wars,” Indiana Jones, James Bond and Harry Potter films. The idea, I think, is to value what is good at whatever level you find it. “Spiderman II” is one of the great comic superhero movies but it is not great art. – Ebert “Games vs. Art: Ebert vs. Barker”
If Ebert can appreciate the Art in this so called “Trash” then why are games not so qualified? In the same article he makes what might be one of the most over quoted things he ever said. (besides the thumbs up thing):
If you can go through “every emotional journey available,” doesn’t that devalue each and every one of them? Art seeks to lead you to an inevitable conclusion, not a smorgasbord of choices. – Ebert “Games vs. Art: Ebert vs. Barker”
Does choice ruin art? It seems to me that Roger Ebert is missing the point, a game can and most games do have an “inevitable conclusion” independent of their “smorgasbord of choices”. As an example, in the GTA series, players are in a sandbox and have a great number of possible choices. Yet no matter what choices the player makes, as long as they participate, they will come to the “inevitable conclusion” that life is a absurd state in which mundane existence is a mere break in our nature as petty, violent, and greedy insects climbing for the top. How many pieces of Art have tried to convey this message? GTA conveys this message to new audience in a new way through the very nature of it game mechanics. That is Art.
I’d have to say that there are only two good points that Roger Ebert manages to make. The first is that Famous Game producers are not rigorous in their approach to Games as Art. Clive Barker and Kellee Santiago are obviously no match for Roger Ebert, but their inability to defend Games as Art shouldn’t be taken as condemnation of Games as Art. The second point is one that it is hard to find a quote for. It is a point he seems to skirt around, but it is there as the subtext to all he writes. Games are not Art because those with power to create games are not artists they are business guys.
Penny Arcade is Right
Of course Penny Arcade is right, but not for the reason they think. It is essential that Games are considered Art and are critiqued as Art. This feedback will convince Game Companies to place Artists (Game Designers) in charge of their games and allow them to express themselves. A world where this is true is a world with great games, which do all that all other great Arts do and more.
Answer
Art is not easily defined by any philosophy and Philosophers much greater then Roger Ebert have argued over and written great treatises on the subject. My answer to Roger Ebert’s good points and Tycho’s question are the same; you just have to look to the top. Is the person who conceives of the game, makes the decisions, and has the final say an Artist Game Designer? Is this Artist Game Designer actually deeply involved with the creation of the game? If both answers are yes; the game is Art. If either answer is no, then the game isn’t Art. It is that simple.
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I think that games people have way to much of a need to justify their existence. Are games art? Potentially. Same as any other medium. Is music art? Sure. Is music composed for commercials art? Not as much. If I write software that works its way around a circle of fifths and generates something that compositionally functions as a song, is that art? Definitely not.
IMO, there’s a difference between being an artisan and being an artist. Anthony Bourdain makes this point in Kitchen Confidential regarding chefs who consider themselves “artists”. It applies to the games industry as well. If you take photo reference and accurately model a football stadium, does that make you an artist? No. If you can do it skillfully, I’d consider you an artisan, which is something to be proud of.
Dierdre Kiai or the guys at newsgaming.com I would consider art, because they have something to say and are using games as a medium of expression. FIFA is not art. GTA is pretty fun and was innovative as a game, but I don’t know if I’d consider it art either.
The whole argument of “what is art?” is very dangerous ground – everyone has their own idea of what constitutes an piece of artwork and everyone will rush to defend their positions.
Ebert writes: “No one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great poets, filmmakers, novelists and poets.”
And sure, I have to agree there. The dialogue in Final Fantasy is never going to win a competition against Wordsworth’s “Surprised by Joy” or anything written by Rilke.
However, Final Fantasy does have some beautiful artwork. Ont of my favourite examples of video games as art is Last Odyssey. There is some really beautiful art work and great writing in that game. I consider those aspects of the game art.
Ebert also says, “My notion is that [art] grows better the more it improves or alters nature through an passage through what we might call the artist’s soul, or vision.”
This definition ultimately only fits what the individual chooses to call art. Will I still feel anything for the dialogue and art in Lost Odyssey in 30 years? I don’t know (and Ebert won’t be around for me to say “nyah nyah” to if I do anyway).
Maybe this is part of the problem with video games as art: We buy a game. We play it, interact with it, feel any number of emotions (frustration, elation, boredom…) maybe we finish it, maybe we don’t – and then we don’t pick it up again.
We sell it back to EB Games and get something else.
Poems, paintings, sculptures as we see them in galleries have a lot of “replay value” in them. When they are good, they are truly immortal and they change as you do. You get something new from them every time you view them – video games are relatively new when compared to painting and sculpture and perhaps are seen as part of our throw-away culture’s desire to be entertained.
Maybe we should open a video game art gallery – is part of what we call art where it’s displayed? Would we take the artwork and sculptures that go into making a video game more seriously if there were velvet ropes and guided tours?
I believe we still view video games as a silly past time whereas “art” is Very Serious Business and not to be taken lightly.
Of course creating games can be (and probably is for the most part) “usually carried out for remuneration” – and why shouldn’t it? If the “remuneration” is based on turning out any old piece of crap for money – fine, I could agree that maybe the products of those sorts of efforts are not art.
But that’s true – for me – of things I’ve seen in galleries too. For instance, the giant baby head in the National Gallery is utterly absurd and pointless. The cut scenes in Lost Odyssey have more right to be called art than that giant, creepy head (in my opinion anyway) but the giant head is Very Serious Business and is in the gallery and the artwork from Lost Odyssey is not.
I would argue that video games can be art, if, as Christoph points out, the artists are heavily involved with the creation. If the ideas and feelings and emotions they conceived of come to life in the game more or less the way they envisioned – then I’d say it’s art.
I have yet to play any video game that is, in its entirety, art. I see nothing artistic about FedEx quests or grinding levels in games like World of Warcraft – but some of the artwork is really quite beautiful and I enjoy looking at it.
But again, this all my opinion and ultimately I think that’s what art comes down to – personal opinion and experience. What is beautiful and artistic in my eyes, is boring and mundane in an others.
I think we need to give video games more time before we pronounce, absolutely, that they are not art. Art as we conceive of it now has had much longer to evolve – video games are still coming into their own. We’ve come a long way from pixelated space ships and asteroids, but there is still much unexplored territory.