performance work "51" at Blue Orange

      Hey so I am on Instagram if you are on too.  I have mostly been putting up real life pictures and shaky images of me taking pics of zbrush things I have made on my screen.  But here is where to find me https://www.instagram.com/bryn_oh/  I resisted instagram for a long time and other things like Snapchat or twitter because, I don't know, I just don't want to be obsessed with my phone.  My phone kind of became like a lover for a while.  We would play games together late at night, or I might find myself talking to someone only to hear my phone make a cute beep sound.  I would excuse myself to find out why it beeped.  "Oh hey baby whats up? what did you need?  oh someone liked my picture?.. thanks for telling me sweetie.. but I have to get back to this thing.  Oh now don't be like that I promise we will play Mekorama later tonight."  I remember having my phone on my leg and really feeling a warmth flow through me where it was touching.  It was like someone resting their hand on my leg in a familiar way.  After a bit I realized that it was actually quite hot, something to do with my phone battery I think.. but it also felt like love.  Anyway, so yeah I just have my blog, facebook, flickr and Snapchat now.   Well I do also have twitter but i don't use it.  It is so lame.

     So I have to record something I made at Blue Orange ... well months ago.  Blue Orange is a club for both art and music with lots of friendly people hanging out and chatting in a relaxed environment.  I always try to catalogue the various things I do in the virtual world on this blog, but sometimes I am quite slow to do so.  This is one such case.  So for blue orange I decided to make a type of performance work.  I only told Ini Inaka what would happen, and the rest was kept secret.  All we would say is for guests to get ready to take pictures as the performance would happen just once.   The Artwork was called 51.  Actually here is what I said to everyone who came.

Hello everyone thank you for attending the event today
I hope you like the work I have put up around us, but the truth is that it is merely a decoy.  The actual artwork will begin after I say a few words in explanation.  I have made a work that follows the NPIRL movement or school of thought popular with Second Life artists several years ago.

Npirl stands for Not Possible in Real Life.

If you wish to learn more there is still a blog with articles on various works.  http://npirl.blogspot.ca/ The idea behind making a work that is NPIRL is to create something that is unique to this medium we use.  Something that can not be created in a traditional gallery or museum in "real life"  Currently, in Second life, art is often displayed in buildings that are textured to appear to be stone and mortar, they have stairs to walk up (despite our ability to fly) and generally are designed to look like real life gallery spaces.  The walls are lined with 2D pictures and 3D often is a stand alone work meant to look like a marble statue, again as we might see in a museum.

     Openings often have people in cocktail dresses and gentlemen in suits holding pretend wine glasses.   We mimic real life.   It is a form of role play.  And I do not mean this in a negative way,  It makes perfect sense that in creating a familiar, comfortable environment in a virtual space we surround ourselves in things we can associate with and understand. We are projecting onto each other and it is a natural psychological tool to help us navigate and feel grounded.  We seek out realism.

Virtual spaces are a new frontier,considered a new medium to the outside world.  It can be hard for people to imagine their way into it... but perhaps think of it this way.  What can this medium do that is unique to it alone?  For example we have duration in this virtual space, which oil paintings lack.  They are a snapshot in time.  We are open ended with the freedom to choose our direction, which cinema lacks.  Cinema tell us a story and force us to follow a camera.  If we see a doorway or drawer we wish to stop and open we can't.  Cinema doesn't allow this freedom.

However we are active participants in the virtual space, not passive observers.  We dont need to mimic real life, we can instead show them how it is done.  There is, naturally, room for all types of art in second life, my intention here is not to disparage other forms but to suggest an alternative, and hopefully create some interest in the concept of NPIRL or other directions.   For example my focus is on the powerful yet fragile ability to create immersion for the viewer in this medium.  And with VR it will only become more powerful.

There were the Surrealists, Impressionists, Cubists, Neo Classicist and perhaps one day the Immersivists.


My artwork is called 51

That is because you will have 51 seconds to take pictures of the event.  After the performance pick out a favorite image you have taken and it will be displayed here at Blue Orange.  Feel free to edit it down to an abstract pixel or show it as an untouched snapshot, it is all up to you.  Send me and ini inaka a single image with your name as the title and we will put it up for you.

This artwork begins with being mine, but ends with it being yours.  This will be  your show.

Prepare your camera

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image by Dooz (dooozy)
view from above
So I should mention that the original space was set up with sculptures I have made, a bunch of
Image by Grady Echegaray
everyone beginning to fall
mosquitoes and a poem, and it looked like a formal "art opening".  The idea being that everyone was to get comfortable with their surroundings and they recognized the type of opening it was going to be.  However, when I counted down to "1" I then turned the entire build physical.  Physical means that each object of the creation, including the floors and walls, were changed from being a solid object in space to a new object that now followed the rules of gravity.  The entire structure began to collapse along with all the people inside.  The work I had built was 3000 feet above the ground and so everyone fell for almost a minute.  They fell for 51 seconds.. hence the name of the artwork.   Each visitor now had 51 seconds to compose and take photos of
everyone falling, once everyone hits the ground the performance is over and people then get to display the pictures they took during the fall within the gallery space.

That was my work entitled 51.











Image by Dooz


And below is a machinima taken by Nicolex Moonwall of the event.  Nicole had no idea what was going to happen so its kind of funny to watch.  If you see naked people it is because SL has this very embarrassing glitch which, in laggy places (there were 70 people there) has peoples clothes sometimes not rezzing for a while.  SL has had some entertaining glitches over the years and this is one.  Others included peoples hair being attached to their arses when they arrived .. bald with hair on bum great look.  I remember another where sometimes people arrived and would be the opposite sex for a while.  So your friend Sara or Jane might arrive to visit looking like a man squeezed into a dress.


Blue Orange , Project 3 , Bryn Oh and Ini . from Gumbo Productions on Vimeo.

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