ROAM: Walking, Mapping, and Play: Wanderings in Art and Art Education

Abstract

This article explores the use of walking in the artistic practice of contemporary artists Francis Alÿs and Jorge Macchi. The authors propose that these artists use walking and mapping to frame and reframe questions pertaining to social, political, aesthetic, and cultural issues related to structures of power that operate within the city-space. The spatial theories of Henri Lefebvre, Michel de Certeau, and the Situationist International provide a framework for analyzing the notion of space and mobility within the urban landscape. The authors also contend artists’ spatial experiences within the urban city-space create encounters that can provide new territories for art and education. To contextualize the pedagogical implication of the proposed research, in the last section of this article the authors discuss ROAM—a mobile game application that expands critical investigations of walking, mapping, and play. ROAM asks players to let go of control, to intentionally “get lost,” and to create critical and creative engagement with space.

Notes

¹ ROAM received the 2014 Contemporary Art Dealers of Dallas CADD FUNd, a competitive grant awarded for high-impact ideas that need the support of the Dallas-Fort Worth community. The current version of ROAM is a functioning prototype that operates as a browser-based Web application. It can be accessed as a webpage by a “smart phone” or on a computer at the url: www.roamgetlost.com. Libersat intends to continue to expand and enhance ROAM into a native app for IOS and Android phones with extended functionality and connections to social media.

² Players must first accept a lengthy, yet playful, liability clause, agreeing to “follow all traffic laws and proceed with caution.”

³ Hashtags, used on social media sites such as Twitter, are words or phrases preceded by a hash or pound sign (#) and serve to identify a message with a certain topic. Hashtags also allow for a type of hypertext, which facilitates organizing and accessing data from multiple entry points.