Art Form for The Digital Age: Henry Jenkins - Assignment Example

Critique Review Affiliation Critique Review ART FORM FOR THE DIGITAL AGE HENRY JENKINS Henry Jenkins’ “Art Form for the Digital Age,” is about gaming developing and how it is being viewed a digital art (Jenkins, 200). The developing game industry is said to be the most expanding art in the economy today. The author, Henry Jenkins, has a big love and appreciation for art whether it is contemporary or of any other kind. He is greatly mesmerized by the recent rise and increased development of computer games that represent their own form of art regarded to as digital art. In writing the essay, the writer aims at increasing the views and consideration of computer games as a new form of art that may be very helpful and educative as it is developed with precise clarity. Getting everything into attention, although video games can be frightful and violent it should be remarked that it is not always necessary for art to take the form of world harmony and tranquility (Jenkins, 2000). Video games have for some time now been seen in a negative light, and people cannot overcome that many video games are powerful or prevent children from being active. Some people, however, appear to desperately trying to accuse video games of all the decadence morals seen in society. The truth remains that for a child to be negatively affected by a fictional game, and then the game is the only source of knowledge he or she gets. There are many children who can operate video games like mortal combat without becoming aggressive themselves. It highly on how their parents instilled their morals in them. As for children who are mainly affected by video games, they tend to emulate the actions they seen in violent games (Jenkins, 2000). This is as a result of parents either lacking much time or either the will to bring them up the way they would have preferred. These parents tend to shift the blame from their children and blame the video games. Video games keep a set cultural legality with several of the latest modes of art of the past and today. They can and should be regarded acts of art because that is what they are made up of. Video games are 3-D interactive paintings with color, shadowing, and essentially every principle that governs any hand created art. They affect our feelings while interacting with our insights as well, just as a video or art would. Moreover, would one not be at a position to call the inventors of the games experts? They are certainly using their artistic skills and creations just as an artisan would to depict their vision to the public. Video games put various things in certain positions for some reason (Jenkins, 2000). As the world is moving from analog to digital and technologically concentrated, these video games perform as the fairy tales did to children of the past. They develop the creation, interactive skills, and cover children in their tales. Precisely they show the impact of technology on culture. Their importance on the growing culture of the future is indisputable. I, therefore, conclude that video games have been improperly depicted as a negative pass time for children when they could rather be very accurate tools (Jenkins, 2000). Summary of Henry Jenkins’ essay “Art Form for the Digital Age” In this essay, Henry Jenkins claims that the video games represent a new art and that video games have expanded what computers do into motion. He also argues that video games have brought what used to be only available in certain locations now available in our own bedrooms. Jenkins says “Games show a fresh lively art, one being appropriate for the new age as those former media were designed for the machine age” (Jenkins, 2000). What he only means by this is that the video games have replaced art and have turned into something that gamers can essentially be a part of. When he states that the experimentation and innovation are broadly accessible, he is saying that playing video games and making them better is worldwide (Jenkins, 2000). There are children that play video games across the world and the people that bring the many diverse differences of video games are located all over the world. Jenkins also states that video games “do matter” and “they spark the inventions of our children, guiding them on epic quests to strange new worlds” (Jenkins, 2000). Stating this makes his argument seem as if there is nothing else for children to broaden their imaginations. Jenkins then moves his argument to the cinema industry. He states that the video games do not provoke human feelings as a movie would. He then argues, supposedly, within the next few years, that video games were going to start having the ability to have effect on the game player’s emotions. Jenkins concludes the article by saying that the brighter minds in the video game industry will find more productive ways to produce better video games. He also says that the potential for game makers is to get their games to a wider variety of people, but if the public does not support them, the game makers will not see that possible (Jenkins, 2000). Analysis The author, Henry Jenkins, provides a valid and practical point of view die to the amount of time and energy the game developers put into the creation of these video games. The author shows the validity of his point of view using clear and definite comparison and examples (Jenkins, 2000). He presents an arguably valid point that is greatly significant to the current situation and happening in the modern world where computer games are being centered on by majority of Americans due to the games entertaining and at times educative qualities. The language used is simple, but target oriented as the author uses terms and description language that mainly targets frequent gamers or persons interested in gaming. The target audience based on the essay is the common man or average person who might find art amusing and would like to have enlightenment on the art presented by video games. It is more of an informative article informing the public of the existence of art in the creation of video games. I am in great support of the opinions of Henry Jenkins and support his thesis (Jenkins, 2000). Response In order to ascertain if video games are a form of art, we need some sense as to where the form of art might rest. Video games blend elements from stories, (Quod.lib.umich.edu., 2014) fictional films, sports, and music (Smuts, 2005). They are arguably a form of the sister art of the modern and moving image, clearly, digital animation. Video games are played as sports, and the programming code is like music notes that are performed by the computer. It is arguable that anything that requires a form of creativity is an art work. Jenkins in his article also notes how the video games can be violent, one may agree to this to a very small extent since for a young child to play violent video game and have it consequently influence them only shows that the child has been deluded to the real environment and has been raised improperly (Smuts, 2005). Henry Jenkins feels as though this artisan is not made of proper critics, and it is not viewed at in a broad and significant manner. One of the main principal’s things that are loved about the artist writing was the examination of the two sides of the dispute good and bad. For instance, he reveals how great video games can be for children and their creativity and interacting with others (Squire, 2003). On the other side though touches on the knowledge that a lot of modern games are violent and not child friendly (Smuts, 2005). The way he applied Gilbert Seldes to improve further drive his point is another excellent way that he used to stress his point. Jenkins has revealed how video games are acknowledged a part of the art through a planned manner (Smuts, 2005). He goes beyond by not only seeing the video games as only tools for fun, but he also looks deeper into the machinery of those video games by questioning some artists to emphasize on his idea. He speaks about the stress that artists do for better presentation in video games. He also adds, that people in these current days are more interested in characters, in video games more than the look of the said characters. Therefore, the creators are required to do more work on presenting characters that resemble humans in their sensations, feelings, and even their activities in order to satisfy the purchasers and that great job is deemed art (Squire, 2003). Conclusion The article presents a very comprehensive and persuasive explanation of why video games should be regarded to as modern art. The author, Henry Jenkins, presents a valid discussion showing that artists use the computer as a tool to create, design, and present their creativity to the world (Jenkins, 2000). According to the responses, discussed the author has great support for his opinion and video game developers and designers should be regarded to as artists, and they should receive the prestige that is given to other artists in other forms of recognized art works. If an individual is acting as a character that is simulating themselves for many hours in a day, would this character not be as a significant character they have only watched for a while in the film. This question is greatly common in large multiplayer online position playing games where people consume hundreds of hours perfecting a character and socializing with other people and the surroundings (Jenkins, 2000). I am relatively sure that those individuals would willingly give up a film than a character they have consumed so much time watching. In today’s growing precise life, I believe that these games present a different developmental function in the adults of the future, in the world, as well. In may opinion, I greatly agree with the author since I am a core gamer, and I appreciate the clarity, design and detail that the programmers and game developers display in these games (Jenkins, 2000). References Jenkins, H. (2000). Art form for the digital age. TECHNOLOGY REVIEW-MANCHESTER NH-, 103(5), 117-120. Ryan, M. (2012). Are Video Games Art?. R. Gobbe. Squire, K. (2003). Video games in education. Int. J. Intell. Games & Simulation, 2(1), 49-62. Smuts, A. (2005). Are Video Games Art?. Contemporary Aesthetics, 3. Jenkins, H. (2005). Games, the new lively art. Handbook of computer game studies, 175-192. Quod.lib.umich.edu. (2014). Are video games art?. [online] Retrieved from: http://quod.lib.umich.edu/c/ca/7523862.0003.006?rgn=main;view=fulltext [Accessed: 16 Mar 2014]. Smudailymustang.com. (2010). Opinion blog: the art form of the digital age : smu daily mustang. [online] Retrieved from: http://www.smudailymustang.com/?p=25359 [Accessed: 16 Mar 2014]. Read More