Show Response: Girl Mode
by Allyson Dwyer
Kate McGee is living in 3023, knowing that the secret of our reality is that it's virtual and by design, always has been. She has crafted a game that is actually a moving poem, a textured movie. Have you ever wondered what it's like to embody a smash cut? Is this how Princess Zelda experiences Hyrule? I have always hated my body, always longed to experience an ethereal existence, fed no doubt by a digital addiction. Still, I was hesitant on VR, because all I was shown were video games, products, objectives. Then on an unsuspecting weekday, Kate placed the portal on my eyes, and I was in a stunning chiachurso world, looking down at my digital hands and a digital desk. I turned on the lamp, picked up a sheet of paper, and like a spell her words gave shape to things I always felt and my soul knew. The unreality of existing, a disassociation that untangles the soul across space and time, the loneliness and growth of that singular experience. My hands pulled the triggers that performed the tasks, but I was not there, I was back at SohoRep. But also, I was there, still there.
Girl Mode contains objectives, but unlike a typical video game, there is no accruing, no scoring, no boss battles. You are tasked only with living through days that bleed into one another, chasing a floating flower down a twinkling road through familiar rooms, snowy forest paths, the liminal space of the desk we dream upon. The simple act of pouring tea is an accomplishment, the weight of digitized liquid falling from my hands into the cup as I poured tea for the first time as a pixelated soul. The emotions are the objective, and in feeling them I have felt more alive this month than all year - the difference between 20 minutes of expression stretching the medium, and 200+ hours of a Nintendo product where what I accomplished will remain inside the SD card, leaving no trace of importance in my life. I'd like to go back into Kate's world, where I felt immediate intimacy with its creator and the digital crooks and nannies of my mind-palace, where I wanted to linger, where theater felt virtually realized and I felt realized, virtually.
I am looking forward to the next iteration of Kate's project, and now for a VR future built by tender artistic adventurous souls.