Berlin – Schwules Museum! Rainbow Arcade – The exhibition on LGBTQIA representation in video game history opened yesterday. The exhibition is a must-go exhibition in the city for all game lovers.
It does not matter if you are gay, lesbian or heterosexual.. For the first time worldwide, the queer history of video games are explored in a major exhibition: Rainbow Arcade! WE LOVE IT! The exhibition is art directed by our very own Nicolas Simoneau!
The exhibition features a wide variety of exhibits spanning over 30 years of media history, including playable titles, concept drawings, modifications written by fans themselves and documentations of online communities. The exhibition is taking stock of contemporary pop cultural questions of representation, stereotypical and discriminatory narratives in entertainment media, and our cultural memory.
For the first time, research by the LGBTQ Game Archive are presented in a museum. It is a masterpiece of modern LGBTQ art. If you are in Berlin do not miss it!!!!! The exhib ition goes on till May 13th. 2019 at Schwules Museum!
It is remarkable that while video games have become a natural part of our contemporary culture, almost every new release that portrays LGBTIQ* people and the realities of life in a negative way is quickly celebrated as groundbreaking or discredited as sudden ideological politicization. Yet there are a few examples of mainstream titles from the 1990s featuring relatively sensible coming-out storylines and same-sex marriage & flirting options.
»Rainbow Arcade« asks not only how social discourses and developments have been reflected in video games and if there has been any major progress in regards of LGBTIQ* representation in entertainment media. In addition, the exhibition explores issues regarding our digital memory and the unique challenges posed by digital culture to archives and institutions and the archival absence of contemporary queer media history.
»Rainbow Arcade« is curated by an internationally well networked team of curators, consisting of Sarah Rudolph (herzteile.org), Jan Schnorrenberg (Schwules Museum) and Dr. Adrienne Shaw (Temple University, LGBTQ Game Archive). For further press inquiries, the press department of Schwules Museum will be happy to connect you with the curators at any time.
»Rainbow Arcade« is a cooperation between Schwules Museum, the LGBTQ Game Archive, Computerspielemuseum Berlin and Temple University in Philadelphia, PA (USA). The exhibition is also an official partner & program component of gamesweekberlin 2019 (8 – 14 April 2019) and other project partners are Booster Space, BerlinGameScene.com und Jugend im Museum e.V..
»Rainbow Arcade« is funded by the Senate Department for Culture and Europe of Berlin.
find out more: www.schwulesmuseum.de
Schwules Museum
Lützowstraße 73
10785 Berlin
