Images from artist’s website: jenovachen.info

The art-videogame ‘Journey’ is a stunning, illustrative experience and whilst visiting ‘Videogames: Deign/Play/Disrupt’ at the V&A I learned about the production and art of the game.

Jenova Chen is the art director and concept artist of the indie videogames company ‘thatgamecompany’. He, and his company, are award winning practitioners that have produced the art-games Flow, Flower and Journey. he is also the co-founder of Anapura Ineractive which encourages and support emerging creatives.

Chen describes game content as “The soul of a video game”, and has produced research papers on the concept of ‘Flow’ in games.

A concept that I admire with the game Journey is that it is a multi-player game which allows you to interact with other players over the Internet. However, players cannot talk to each other or touch. They can interact through movement and sound. Creating an uplifting interaction.

There is a philosophy behind his work, he states “I started to realize there is an emotion missing in the modern society, and of course missing in the online console games. It is the feeling of not knowing, a sense of wonder, a sense of awe, at the fact that you don’t understand, at the fact that you are so small and you are not empowered”.(1) Therefore he aims to create games as a space, or an environment, for spirituality and connection. He has said that audiences for film can find romance, sensuality, spirituality and humanity, however in videogames it is difficult to find anything other than violence and the need to win at all costs. I not only appreciate his art style, but also his philosophy.

References:

1. Ohannessian, K., (2012) ‘Game designers Jenova Chen on the art behind his “Journey”‘. Fast Company. Accessed via www.fastcompany.com/1680062/game-designer-jenova-chen-on-the-art-behind-his-journey