Professor Angela Washko was commissioned to create a new video artwork by Fotomuseum Winterthur in Switzerland as part of their exhibition “SITUATIONS/Strike,” on view online August 18 through October 6.
In her video “Weaponizing Courtship”, Washko takes viewers on a digitally mediated deep-dive that explores the integration of military technology into video games and its manifestations in the male seduction field. “Weaponizing Courtship” traces a brief history of how military vision and technology has been incorporated in computer games and refer to artistic interventions into military-influenced gaming spaces. Moreover, Washko presents her research on the practices of several infamous pick-up artists (or seduction coaches), including her critical feminist pick-up artist dating simulator “The Game: The Game.” The pre-recorded performance culminates in a critical playthrough of “Super Seducer,” a commercial video game that uses gaming conventions born out of the militarisation of gaming mechanics – and which uncomfortably and unironically presents women as targets to conquer.