Project Description: Genesis is a virtual real-life computer game. It is an experiment, in which the audience can participate online for over a week, creating a real place, a true community and a physical world according to their own ideas. Participants can log in worldwide for free via the website and control a human avatar via an audio-video interface in a remote industrial hall. Genesis is a social simulation that unites in itself, ideology and criticism. In this completely open setting all its social components are in flux and can transform into one another.

Genesis could transform into an open imagination space, in which the visitors or players are able to project their ideas about a new world. Especially in a situation, in which social isolation, human distances and the lack of resources needs to be modified to keep on dreaming about society. The project starts in an empty industrial hall. The empty space can continuously be extended, transformed and edited with the help of a contingent of materials and tools. Through the online players’ selection of materials, the setting is continuously developed and redesigned over the time of seven days. The audience is invited to create the space according to their own imaginations. Each participation leaves a trace - the sum of these changes and interactions will make up the entity of the work. The entirety is characterized by the personal experience of the individual as well as by the documentation of the entire process. The work will be a continuous setting over seven days, 24 hours without interruption, in which the space will change through the active and independent reconfiguration of the visitors. Human avatars will live there for that period of time. The audience or players of Genesis are able to log in from everywhere, worldwide through the website. As the project runs 24h a day all time zones can interact with the project. The players can book an online ticket for a time window beforehand or play instantly if a slot is free. They are able to shape the Genesis process, through guiding one of the human “avatars” inside the industrial hall. The players receive the audio-visual perspective of their avatar, which are equipped with VR Glasses and a camera. This camera continuously transmits the vision from a first-person perspective to the browser window of the player. In this inter- face the players have the opportunity to give instructions. A wide selection of tools and materials is available for selection in a menu inside the game. Their player’s task is to operate their avatar through the space and instruct and co- operate, in order to establish a physical and social setting. The avatars appear as yourself, through whose eyes one can look and whose bodies can be instructed. The other possibility is to overview the entire event through a 24-hour livestream, which records from a bird’s eye view independently and in documentary form. To look at the synthesis again from the outside. Like in a VR setting or a computer game, the audience can influence the happening. This interaction can take on a wide range of social forms of communication and smooth a widespread way of possible actions in the hall.

Team: Alexander Schubert - Concept, Room, Artistic Head

Heinrich Horwitz - Performer Coaching, Production, Artistic Assistance

Carl-John Hoffmann - Video, Artistic Assistance

Carola Schaal, Yana Eva Thönnes, Max Pross, Fabian Oehl - Performers / Avatars

Lisa Clemen, Juliette Krauss, Julian Sippel - Set Design

Jacob Sello - Arm Interface

Luca Befera - Transcription and Ethnographic Protocol

Christoph Lohse (Büro für Exakte Ästhetik) - UI + UX

Dominic Osterried - Web Development

Gerhard Kühne, Christian Frank, Kai Lietzke, Cedric Johanson, Peter Wolff - Documentation

Francis Wernecke, Vitus Stoiber, Felix Stoiber - Inventory Handling

Tâm Phạm, Rica Zinn, Yuri Akbalkan, Miguel Retamero - Inventory Photography

Clara Braun, Thordis M. Meyer, Helena Krey, Chiara Lüssow, Lucie Trittmann, Carlotta Bauer, Lina Lev, Sarah Ernst, Zwang Starkowski, Yuri Akbalkan, Victor E. Gutiérrez Cuiza, Pedro González Fernández, Tâm Phạm, Michael Brailey, Orestis Papaioannou, Bas Hendrickx, Irini Aravidou - Rehearsal Avatars

Partners and Collaborations

Internationales Musikfest Hamburg 2020

Commissioned by Elbphilharmonie Hamburg 2020

Decoder Ensemble Kraftwerk Bille

Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg

A MAZE (Media Partner)