Thursday, December 15, 2005
Videogames as art?
IGN has a rather interesting article about whether videogames should be considered art in reaction to Roger Ebert's assertion that videogames are not art and has [Ebert] a rather elitest take on the whole issue.
My belief is that videogames are indeed art. The people who make the games have a vision and express this vision in the medium they chose. I may not be what you may call an art-lover but that seems to me to be one part of art which is expressing yourself.
Ebert would be wise to remember that when movies were a new phenomenon, the cultural elites did not want to consider that art and scoffed at the medium. Same with comics, new forms of music, etc. Just because the medium is highly interactive and many allow for the viewer to manipulate the art in some way does not disclude it.
People like Ebert need to get off their high horse when it comes to new cultural mediums and accept that videogames have as much right as TV, music, paintings, and movies to be considered art.
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My belief is that videogames are indeed art. The people who make the games have a vision and express this vision in the medium they chose. I may not be what you may call an art-lover but that seems to me to be one part of art which is expressing yourself.
Ebert would be wise to remember that when movies were a new phenomenon, the cultural elites did not want to consider that art and scoffed at the medium. Same with comics, new forms of music, etc. Just because the medium is highly interactive and many allow for the viewer to manipulate the art in some way does not disclude it.
People like Ebert need to get off their high horse when it comes to new cultural mediums and accept that videogames have as much right as TV, music, paintings, and movies to be considered art.
