Threadsteading
In the era of “The Internet of Things” where our toaster can give us updates on our smartphone, our vision of what a video game can potentially need to be radically expanded. Threadsteading does exactly this through the use of hacked digital embroidery machines. Set up as a simple two-player competitive territory conquest game, each player inputs their moves to capture and explore the map according to the game’s rules. Only in this case, the map is set on fabric quilt squares, and the moves are intricately sewn onto the map as the game progresses. These tactile and contextual changes to the input and output systems completely upend the players’ expectations of the experience of technology, so often focused on sleek hardware framed with macho bluster. By fusing repurposed domestic appliances as input devices and utilizing a novel, and permanent, output system, Threadsteading challenges us to think much more broadly about the way technology is gendered and expand the possibilities for the broad vision of video games’ impact on the future.
Creators: Gillian Smith, Lea Albaugh, Jim McCann, April Grow, Chenxi Liu, Jen Mankoff
Link: https://youtu.be/tgnitvfP4iM
Connections:
Miriam Schapiro - Anatomy of a Kimono
Rozsika Parker - The Subversive Stitch
Betsy Greer - Craftivism