The Council on Gender Sensitivity… - Angela Washko
Angela Washko’s The Council of Gender Sensitivity and Behavioral Awareness in World of Warcraft is an intervention deep into the fantasy realms of World of Warcraft. Wandering the digital vastness, Washko and her compatriots reimagine the game by acting as interviewers, collecting answers to questions about the way players think, gender, sex, and identity. Washko then turns these interventions into videos, images, performances, and even a darkly ironic game show. This work is critical to the conversation because by foregrounding the massive scope of possible social conversations it draws out the biases of these supposedly techno-utopian virtual fantasy spaces that are typically hidden behind violence. These wide-ranging conversations often end up centering around specifically extreme reactions of the gaming public to the use of the term feminism. Though it is often dispiriting, Washko’s “Council” also highlights how very simple changes in how we engage with video games (such as choosing to interview players rather than go questing) can be used to start the process of undermining assumption and reimagining a more inclusive future for these growing digital communities.
Artist: Angela Washko
Connections:
Micol Hepbon - “Gallery Tally”
The Guerrilla Girls - “Review the Whitney”