“In the year 2065, Farsight Corporation learns to harness the power of artificial intelligence. With all work taken care of by algorithms, people spend all day playing video games against AIs. Inside the game, can anybody tell the difference between art and the world?”
Rendered from the point of view of an AI game designer, 2065 is a continuously expanding open-world video game set on the eve of the future Singapore Centennial. The game continues the worldbuilding of Lek’s 2017 film Geomancer, where widespread adoption of AI has created a post-work society and a corresponding appetite for endless entertainment and cultural production.
Players start from a simulacrum of the physical exhibition space, gradually exploring a virtual island that is itself an architectural collage; each new iteration of the game incorporates the locations of its exhibition. The first manifestation at K11 Hong Kong included a simulation of the gallery space and digital exhibition. Later versions at the Barbican in London and at the Singapore Biennale (both 2019) reflected the post-colonial context of futurity; ‘2065’ refers to the centennial year of Singapore’s independence.
In the physical spaces, the installations mimic the layout of the virtual world, thereby acting as gateways for the audience to become active participants in the narrative.
