Ongoing Projects
Engaging Beyond Our Walls
American University's Game Center and the DC Public Library have received a two-year, $249,000 grant to offer libraries tools, training and templates to create neighborhood games. Called "Engaging Beyond Our Walls," the project addresses three needs lacking in public libraries:
- basic training in game design for communities,
-templates of successful games result in community participation, including with ties to local history and public space,
-free authoring tools that are easy enough for non-technical users to create games.
Libraries will leverage their expertise in media literacy and local information to help give everyone access to game design tools, amplify overlooked voices and engage new audiences.
American University’s press release, DCPL’s press release, and the IMLS grant proposal are all publicly available at the provided links.
Hive Mechanic
Currently a co-designer and tester for Hive Mechanic, an open-source game engine designed for democratizing game design in civic and community settings that utilizes SMS technology.
See blog posts I’ve written about Hive Mechanic and its potential for interactions with alternate controllers.
CV Attribution: Stokes, B., Karr, C., Arroyo, H., Loewen, M. and contributors (2020-present). Hive Mechanic: A Game Engine for Cities to Embed Storytelling and Interactivity. Open source code published on GitHub.
This project is part of my contributions to the Playful City Lab run by Dr. Benjamin Stokes at American University.
Completed Projects
Buoyant Oracle
To accompany this 50-foot surrealist sculpture, we designed an “oracle” to engage with visitors by text message. The oracle sends annotated photographs (similar to polaroids), revealing the hidden history and philosophy of the artwork. More playfully, the oracle picks different “readings” of paired poetry and remixed images of the sculpture for each visitor. Featuring mounted signs with QR codes that start the text message conversation.
The sculpture and project received coverage from our local (Washington, DC) Public Broadcast Station, WETA, for the “Around Town” segment as well as from the local publication, RestonNow.
September 2021 Update: We have received additional funding through a seed grant from the GLB Memorial Fund to add an additional 20 predictions to the oracle from women and female identifying artists living the DC/Maryland/Virginia region. More information including the open call for artists is available here.
This project is part of my work as a consultant to The Playful City Lab run by Dr. Benjamin Stokes at American University, in collaboration with artist Sue Wrbican and the Tephra (formerly known as the Greater Reston Arts Center).
DC Office of Planning + Art All Night Anacostia
During the community outreach phase of DC Office of Planning’s Pennsylvania Avenue SE Great Streets Initiative, the Playful City Lab created a game, “Hard Choices” to increase genuine engagement with residents to collect community comment somewhere beyond virtual town hall meetings attended by fewer than 20 people.
The game was created in Hive Mechanic and was used at a variety of community events in Anacostia, including Art All Night 2021 where we brought the AU Humanities Truck along with it to have a more physical presence at the event.
At the culmination of these events, we generated a report for the DC Office of Planning.
Adams Morgan Day
I have co-developed several interactive activities, highlighted as part of the “History and Culture” content for the Adams Morgan Day street festival in 2019 and 2020. These include Mural, Mural on the Wall (an SMS-based mural hunt), the History Map for Adams Morgan (an SMS-based trivia hunt), and a phone call-based virtual tour of Kalorama Park (listed on the AdMo Day 2020 Events List).
Additionally, I have driven and run exhibitions from the American University Humanities Truck, which has served as a physical anchor/starting location for these interactive activities.
This project was part of my contributions to The Playful City Lab run by Dr. Benjamin Stokes at American University.
DC Storytelling System
A participatory approach to circulating neighborhood stories of history and community change by weaving digital and physical networks together. This project, to date, has led to working with collaborators including the AU Humanities Truck, the Smithsonian Anacostia Community Museum, and the DC Public Libraries.
See blog posts I wrote about the system here on the project website.
As part of this project, I did event production, coding, woodworking, construction of alternate controllers, graphic design, and client co-design work.
This project was part of my contributions to The Playful City Lab run by Dr. Benjamin Stokes at American University.