Sacrifice

Nino Filiu - Sacrifice, 2023
@nino.filiu
Blender, JavaScript, WebGL, WebMIDI

The installation presents an interactive microcosm challenging gaming conventions. In a departure from the well-trodden paths of gamepads and joysticks, this unique setup invites participants to navigate and shape the world using DJ decks as their control device.
Jog wheels, tempo sliders and play/pause buttons have been made to mirror their native functions on DJ decks, endowing participants with the power to slow down time, reverse its course, or bring it to a complete standstill. In this endeavor, a compelling exploration of synesthesia emerges, as the language of music is being used to explore the visual domain.
Knobs orchestrate the ballet of the camera, while pads govern the texture of this digital tableau, compelling participants to ponder the visual poetry crafted by the artist. In doing so, they challenge the entrenched gaming stereotype of striving for the highest score along a linear scale. Both an art piece and a technological research in interactivity, Filiu has open sourced the code for the software at the core of the installation. Among the program files, a message log can be read in which we disco- ver that the person in the 3D environment is running away from a frenzied forest rave crowd that went mad. But in the surreal landscape of this artwork, evoking hallucinatory psychosis, can we truly trust these words? That would be up to the participants to decide.