Showing posts with label Kafka. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kafka. Show all posts

Monday, April 10, 2017

The Franz Kafka Video Game (!) Now Available

Yes. Our eyes boggled a little at this idea too. How do you turn Kafka's bizarre stories into a video game that keeps his intent and spirit intact? But the premise isn't unrelated to the way fairy tales get used today, so we thought it was worth a closer look.

Here's the trailer:
How does this relate to fairy tales and 'now'?  Kafka, who incidentally was a great fan of fairy tales, wrote stories using absurd 'wonder' elements - elements which can be more difficult for us to recognize when they emerge out of an industrialized or modern (eg corporate) setting, perhaps because they are considered more mundane than sparkly transformations as they use the elements of everyday life, but are nonetheless 'wondrous' in the true sense of the term (surprise at the unexpected, be that either horrifying or delightful). His stories are, if anything, less extreme than fairy tales but possibly more disturbing because of it. His stories are reality with a step or two sideways. That small removal however, can be enlightening.

"...by fine tuning our attention to the absurd, Kafka also reflects our shortcomings back at ourselves. In doing so he reminds us that the world we live in is one we create, and have the power to change for the better." (from TED Talk "What is Kafkaesque?")
What better message about the present do we need? Although Kafka's tales tend to be thought of as dark, they're often humorous too, and this humor reminds us that hope is not lost. We like this underlying emphasis on hope and the power of wonder to encourage change! Not unlike fairy tales.

About the game:
The Franz Kafka Videogame is an original puzzle/adventure game inspired by the writings of Franz Kafka. 
The protagonist named K. gets a sudden offer of employment. And this event changes his life, forcing him to make a distant voyage. To his surprise, the world beyond his homeland appears to be not as normal as he would think.
Together with K. you will experience an atmosphere of absurdity, surrealism, and total uncertainty.
 
Key Features:
  • From the Creator of an Award-Winning Hamlet
  • Original Logic Puzzles
  • High-Definition Graphics
  • No inventory. No Boss battles. No RPG features
  • Only Absurdity and Surrealism
The Franz Kafka Videogame is available to purchase and play for $9.99, on Steam.
“The subtle hints, witty puzzles and peculiar visual style grant full authority to say The Franz Kafka Videogame is a worthy way to honor the memory of the brilliant writer”
80 – Riot Pixels

Sunday, March 26, 2017

'Pupa', An Irish Pinocchio Inspired Tale with a Relevant Difference

We didn't get to promote this in time for its run, which ended on Saturday March 25th, but wanted to quickly highlight it anyway to put it on your radar for the future.

Created by Limerick puppeteer Emma Fisher, who also writes and designs, as well as performs with the puppets, this show is definitely a more adult inclined take on Pinocchio, which sounds like it has parallels with The Girl Without Hands as well. (Emma's previous show, 'Spun', considered 'notable' and 'impressive', was kid and family friendly.) Shown at the Lime Tree Theater, by Beyond the Bark, in Ireland this past week., we hope there will be future opportunities for folks to catch this one.

From the press kit:
Pupa 
The freakish metamorphic tale of us. 
A puppet girl struggling with her disabled part splits herself in two, casts off her disabled part and banishes it to the room of forgotten limbs. A puppet boy falls from normality, breaking and reforming. They both go on separate quests to find a sense of wholeness. As they navigate a dark world they encounter many characters on their way- a wise bug, fragmented and broken bodies, singing mouths in jars, and silence. 
Pupa is inspired by the fairy-tale Pinocchio. Transforming and metamorphosing from abled to disabled, such as when he burns his legs of at the fire, along the way Pinocchio is helped by many characters who share their stories with him and make him who he is. 
Pupa derives from the Latin for puppet meaning girl or doll, and is also used to describe the middle stage of an insect’s metamorphosis before it re-emergens as a new creature. This is a metaphor for the transition from able to disabled within the play. 
By mixing puppetry, mask, ceramics, song and film, we will tell the freakish metamorphic tale of us. Audiences will be lead through a multi-sensory, interactive, Kafkaesque, telling of Pinocchio as never seen before.
In a land where we are all different, we question what normal even means, looking at how people with disabilities think society sees them. We are telling stories of coming out/identifying as disabled and navigating the grey area between disabled and abled.
A cool tie-in to note, Beyond the Bark hosted a special puppet-making workshop during the preparation for this show with world renowned puppet and prosthetic hand maker, Ivan Owen, along with creator and Artistic Director Emma Fisher.
A little more about the names behind the creation of the puppets for the show:
IVAN OWEN:Makerspace Lab Manager at the University of Washington, Bothell & an interdisciplinary artist exploring a wide range of topics. Co-inventor of the first open-source 3D printable hand prosthesis & a volunteer for the e-NABLE open prosthetics community. His past work has included musical composition, metal casting, jewelry, recreations of medieval armor and costume and prop making for stage and screen including Modern Family and Outrageous Acts of Science. His most recent project has been working with Emma Fischer to create a functional, wearable mechanical artistic creation & with her exploring ways in which digital fabrication can be utilized in puppetry.
Examples of some of his past & current work can be seen here: EMMA FISHER:Artistic director of Beyond the Bark inclusive puppet and installation theatre, puppeteer/puppet maker, writer and set designer. She is an Irish Times theatre award nominated designer. She has taught puppetry at The London School of Puppetry, Mary Immaculate College and schools, hospitals and community centers across Ireland and the UK. She is constantly pursuing new techniques in puppetry and is delighted to be working with and learning from Ivan Owens on a Travel and Training funded by the Arts Council. www.beyondthebark.ie and http://emmacfisher.wixsite.com/emmafisherdesign
Keep an eye out for these folks and their work! We have a feeling we'll see more adapted fairy tales in the future from these people.