Disillusion is an art project in the form of a strategic board game for two players. Its main characteristic is that, the more you play it, the less you want to play it, leading to a more than likely abandonment of the game. In this page you can find everything related to Disillusion’s development. Disillusion is intended to be eventually published and distributed in regular game shops.
There are five different sections, in chronological order and from bottom to top: 01. Sketches and models (first steps); 02. Rules (an overview); 03. Disillusion and Second Circle (two parallel projects); 04. Record of a conversion (first steps in the game world); 05. Publications; 06. Public presentations (including the Disillusion Tournament).
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06. Public presentations:
06.a. Illusion – Disillusion. Solo exhibition in Artium, museum of contemporary art of Vitoria (Spain)
23rd April-24th June 2012
In Illusion – Disillusion the exhibition space will be transformed in a sort of “game room”. A compilation of works that connect both Illusion (art project in the form of a novel) and Disillusion (art project in the form of a board game) will be displayed. All of them are eminently participative and multidisciplinary. David Maroto’s practice focuses on the crossover between literature and visual arts, on the one hand, and the use of games as a creative method, on the other. The idea is that the spectator acquires an active role in the process of reception of the work, not only by playing/executing each piece separately, but also when reconstructing the network of relations that lead from one work to the next one.
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06.b. GAGARIN, The Artists in Their Own Words. Group show in S.M.A.K.
4th December 2009 – 14th March 2010
S.M.A.K. Museum of Contemporary Art, Ghent (Belgium), is showing a unique & comprehensive exhibition with works of the participating artists of GAGARIN, confronting their textual contributions from the complete GAGARIN oeuvre with works from the museum and special loans. The exhibition includes work by Marc Manders, Allora & Calzadilla, Edith Dekyndt, Lois Weinberger, Philippe Van Snick, Juan Muñoz, Gabriel Kuri, Jimmie Durham, Kirsten Pieroth, Maria Serebriakova, Richard Serra, Willem Oorebeek, Manfredu Schu, Joe Scanlan, Ria Pacquée and others. I participate with Disillusion, which will be in play and display.
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06.c. Never Late than Better, at EFA Project Space, New York
April 11 – May 16, 2009
Opening Reception, Thursday, April 9, 6-8 p.m.
Curated by Trong Gia Nguyen
Artists: Julieta Aranda, Peter Belyi, Hannes Bend, Christopher Chiappa, Eric Doeringer, Josephine Wister Fauire, Marc Ganzglass, Evan Gruzis, Christopher Ho, Marci MacGuffie, David Maroto, Laura Nova, Yuki Onodera, Rebeca Reeve, Egill Saebjornsson, Luke Stettner, Halldor Arnar Ulfarsson, Arnold von Wedemeyer, Mike Womack
More info about Never Late than Better
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06.d. Disillusion Tournament, Tina B. Festival (Prague)
It took place on 11th October 2008 from 15.30 to 22.30 pm in KLUB LÁVKA (Novotného lávka 1, Prague 1).This event was hosted by Tina B. festival and curated by Blanca de la Torre.
Eight players started the first round: Stefano Cagol vs. Daniel González; Avelino Sala vs. Blanca de la Torre; Pablo San José vs. Cynthia Viera; Mariela Rossi vs. Adam Vackár.
Four players got through to the semi-finals: Daniel vs. Blanca; Pablo vs. Mariela.
The best two players disputed the Great Final during the Pink Carpet Party: Daniel vs. Mariela. Daniel became eventually the champion and received his prize during a ceremony after seven hours of Tournament.
More info about Disillusion Tournament
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06.e. In Between
Group show in [De is Ka], Amsterdam 10th – 18th May 2008
I define Disillusion as a public art project because it is planned to be mass produced and distributed in stores in the next future. Disillusion intends to have a long term effect in the public sphere where it is distributed. It has nothing to do with spectacular interventions which look for a quick, ephemeral and superficial result. On contrary, Disillusion is meant to be used by public in their daily contexts and to become a more or less intense experience in their everyday life (just as the reading of a book would do).
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06.f. Presentation at Arti07, The Hague. 27th October 2007. Read more
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06.g. Presentation in O3ONE (Belgrade), in the framework of the Art-e-conomy project, curated by Marko Stamenkovic. 24th May 2007. Read more
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05. Publications
05.a. Gagarin, the artists in their own words
Contribution to issue #19, October 2009
The preliminary notes of my game Disillusion are published for the first time. Other contributing artists in this issue: Danny Devos, Ed Ruscha, Petrit Halilaj, Pierre Bismuth, Ingrid Mwangi, Robert Hutter, Ermias Kifleyesus, Paul Chan.
Gagarin is an artist’s magazine (since 2000) entirely dedicated to the publication of especially written and unpublished texts by artists who are now working anywhere in the world. Concept & coordination, Wilfried Huet
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05.b. An(Other) Publication
Edited by Katarina Zdjelar and Renee Ridgway. Published by Piet Zwart Institute in collaboration with Revolver Archiv für Aktuelle Kunst. April 2007
Book project around manifold perspectives on otherness. Covers for Another Publication were made by 164 international artists. I contributed with page number 13 from Disillusion’s rules book, in which it is explained how to attack the opponent and eventually make his pieces disappear from the game board.
With texts by Mieke Bal, Rosi Braidotti, Boris Buden, Frans-Willem Korsten, Bojana Kunst, Dieter Lesage, Thomas Michelon, Steve Rushton, Hito Steryerl, Nato Thompson, Jan Verwoert and Jelena Vesic.
Among the participant artists: Oliver Ressler, Mieke Bal, Ivan Grubanov, Bik van der Pol, Melvin Moti, Tere Recarens, Carlos Aires, Matthijs de Bruine, Klaas van Gorkum & Iratxe Jaio, Anita Di Bianco, Libia Castro & Olafur Olafsson, Judi Werthein, Risk Hazekamp, Desirée Palmen, Guerrilla Girls, Manon de Boer, Nasrin Tabatabai…
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04. Record of a conversion
For more than a year I participated in different game-events, such as the game fairs Ducosim (Utrecht 2005, 2006) and Internationale Spieltage Essen (2006). It was an interesting and fruitful experience because I could test my game with real experts in that matter, the so-called “gamers”. With their feedbacks and opinions I could adapt step by step my original game Disillusion into a more acceptable version to the game market requirements. At the end of this process of conversion I had already established some contacts in the game world. Disillusion has thus evolved from an art project into a product liable to be mass produced by a game company.
This video shows the process to print a board game. Duration 5′ 26”, colour, sound.
Ducosim game fair. December 2006.
New prototype for Disillusion (called Garden Maze as a possible name for its commercial edition). A very important step was to create a new design for the game that takes into account technical questions regarding a real production for the market. This hand made dummy is not intended to be an unique artwork, but a prototype to be reproduced by a game printer. It reflects the results of multiple tests by “gamers” (whose opinion orientated me towards what “a good game” must be like) and meetings with game printers for technical matters (regarding materials, thickness, measurements and other kinds of solutions). The design of the game fits now in a A4 size standing box, book case-like in which all the elements are kept.
Essen Internationale Spieltage. October 2006. Read more.
Ducosim game fair. December 2005. Disillusion was presented in the “game world” for the first time.
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03. Disillusion and Second Circle
These two projects grew up with parallel lives. From the beginning I thought of Disillusion and Second Circle as two projects that would complement each other. The ideas that came from the development of one of them could be applied to the other one and vice versa. Disillusion was the source where all Second Circle’s works came from. For many years, every work that I created was directly or indirectly related to Disillusion in different ways:
-Some themes present in Disillusion were used to create series of works. For instance, dealing with the idea of abandonment gave way to some works about artists who had stopped their art practices (for example: Adieu Jean-Arthur, Dear Wolf, SS_Seth Siegelaub)
-Many other works are materializations of certain moments, situations or stages through which the players get through in a play of Disillusion (for example: Flash, Exit Way, Wearing Phase)
-There are some numerical codes in the structure of the game that were implemented in the production of new pieces (for example: 12 Tales Machine, Project of Self-Portrait, 12/0)
-Some other works ultimately refer to some game’s elements (for example: 7 Stamps and 6+6 make clear reference to the seven game’s pieces)
-Finally, some other works reflect the inner structure of Disillusion, which is formalized in loops and recursive structures (for example: Air, Map, Acrostic, Video).
In 2005-06, during a one-year-long project, I showed different combinations of Second Circle’s works in installations that I called Proposals. For more information about this project follow these links: To read more about Second Circle. To see the first proposal, Docero. To see the second proposal, Adieu (with Disillusion). To see the second proposal, in its second version: Adieu W139 (with Disillusion). To see the third proposal, Recur. To see the fourth proposal, CuldeSac (with Disillusion).
In the proposals where Disillusion was on view it was also possible for public to play it. The positive responses encouraged me to take the next step, to take the project out of the art context where it had been created and insert it in the game market.
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02. Rules
Disillusion has three levels on which to be played. Players start on Level A till they feel that they have a certain control over the game’s dynamics and it is time to upgrade to the next level. Each level adds a little set of rules to the already existing ones and, in so doing, alters the game in unexpected turns. With this system players learn to play it gradually, from a basic version to the full game. What follows below are not the rules of the game, but a rough description of the situations it gives way to:
LEVEL A: On this level, also known as Wear Phase, one plays to win, as in a conventional game. One of the players must lose for the other to win. It is a struggle between “I”, the subject, and “you”, the opponent, the other. The meaning of the game is to strip the opponent of her 6 pieces (also called Illusions), whilst keeping at least one of yours. The Illusions are played in rounds. When one loses a round, he also loses an Illusion. The game can thus take between six and eleven rounds. There are rules to play each round on the board, to accomplish your goals in the game, and to attack the opponent.
LEVEL B: This level is also called Flash. A little set of rules is added, so that a new situation in the game is created: The player who is losing finds herself in a very advantageous position to win the game in the next round. In other words, the closer you are to lose, the closer you get to win and vice versa. This dynamic might cause an on growing feeling of frustration in the players. Playing to win only leads to your own defeat. On the other hand, playing to lose would most likely lead to the same result. Disillusion enters in this way an absurd loop and becomes a game that, the more you play it, the less you want to play it. This situation may very well lead to the abandonment of the game. Players do get thus through an actual experience of disillusionment, limited perhaps within the boundaries of a game, but actual anyhow.
LEVEL C: If players do not abandon the game, they can opt for upgrading to the last level. Level C (also called Exit Way) offers a compensation game for those who lost by Flash at an early stage of the play, in one of the first rounds (the sooner Flash happens, the more intense the disillusion is). By way of this special compensation game, the players get the means to create their own Illusions and add them as pieces to play in the game. Although Disillusion’s absurd condition cannot be overcome, the rules of the game nonetheless open so that players can modify its dynamics to a certain extent.
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01. Sketches and models
The first notions I had about Disillusion contemplated two basic ideas. One, the new artwork had to adopt the form of a board game that, the more you played it, the less you wanted to play it, creating a situation that may eventually lead to the abandonment of the game. Two, it would be in close relation to Second Circle and both projects would have a parallel development, complementing each other throughout their different phases.
Disillusion is an art project in the form of a strategic board game for two players. Its main characteristic is that, the more you play it, the less you want to play it, leading to a more than likely abandonment of the game. Disillusion has three levels on which to be played. Players start on Level A till they feel that they have a certain control over the game’s dynamics and it is time to upgrade to the next level. Each level adds a little set of rules to the already existing ones and, in so doing, alters the game in unexpected turns. With this system players learn to play it gradually, from a basic version to the full game. What follows below are not the rules of the game, but a rough description of the situations it gaves way to:
LEVEL A: On this level, also known as Wear Phase, one plays to win, as in a conventional game. One of the players must lose for the other to win. It is a struggle between “I”, the subject, and “you”, the opponent, the other. The meaning of the game is to strip the opponent of her 6 pieces (also called Illusions), whilst keeping at least one of yours. The Illusions are played in rounds. When one loses a round, he also loses an Illusion. The game can thus take between six and eleven rounds. There are rules to play each round on the board, to accomplish your goals in the game, and to attack the oponent.
LEVEL B: This level is also called Flash. A little set of rules is added, so that a new situation in the game is created: The player who is losing finds herself in a very advantageous position to win the game in the next round. In other words, the closer you are to lose, the closer you get to win and vice versa. This dynamic might cause an on growing feeling of frustration in the players. Playing to win only leads to your own defeat. On the other hand, playing to lose would most likely will lead to the same result. Disillusion enters in this way an absurd loop and becomes a game that, the more you play it, the less you want to play it. This situation may very well lead to the abandonment of the game.
LEVEL C: If players do not abandon the game, they can opt for upgrading to the last level. Level C (also called Exit Way) offers a compensation game for those who lost by Flash at an early stage of the play, in one of the first rounds (the sooner Flash happens, the more intense the disillusion is). By way of this special compensation game, the players get the means to create their own Illusions and add them as pieces to play in the game. Although Disillusion’s absurd condition cannot be overcome, the rules of the game nonetheless open so that players can modify its dynamics to a certain extent.
