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Untitled( C.U.G. I) is an interactive art installation that consists mostly of a modified/ hacked virtual copy of the shooter game “Serious Sam: The Second Encounter”, to be projected on either wall or on a digital screen. 

The main virtual landscape consists of a deformed copy of the my childhood neighborhood (C.U.G. – Iași) implemented using 3D data from Google Maps, which the audience can explore using the provided controller or modified keyboard and mouse.

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I wanted to create a work of art that used the apparently cold language of software and programming to talk about my personal experience of living in 2000s-era Romania, in an ex-communist neighborhood that suffered economic and social degradation after the 1989 Revolution, as well as the oncoming waves of liberalization.

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Lastly, I felt that being born at the end of the 20th century meant that I have the opportunity, or rather the responsibility, to express the visual language of the new century through newly established mediums that have already left a lasting impact on our culture and society at large: the screen, video games, and the Internet. 

Using a combination of the choice of video-game genre (first-person shooter), the choice of the game (“Serious Sam: The Second Encounter”), and the choice of hacking or modifying a piece of software for artistic usage, the work rejects classical ways of representation to speak on the social and cultural aspects of living in Romania during the 2000s.

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