Monkeys, Machines, and Multi-Perspectivities

Monkeys, Machines, and Multiperspectivities is a call to embrace the transformative power of play. As visitors move through this experimental landscape, they will encounter new perspectives, rethink their roles in the world, and explore how small shifts in perspective can unlock vast potential for creative and collective action. Through this dynamic intersection of art, science, and play, the project offers a vision of a future defined by empathy, interconnectedness, and the endless possibilities of the ludic mind.
Presented through the lens of the Psycho-Ludic Approach (with methods by artistic research, experimental psychology and neuroscience), this exhibition challenges conventional ideas of agency, perspective, and societal structures and explore alternative motivations for play. The current global crises show that humanity’s exploitation-based strategies have come to an end: conquering new worlds, accumulating possessions and winning. These strategies, which are now failing, are reflected in games and their mechanisms.

Situated within the physical manifestation of a game engine—a world-machine-conglomerate—this exhibition environment becomes a space where the playful mind engages with pressing universal issues, exploring them through experimental games. Multiperspectivity is the key concept driving this exhibition. It emerges as the first result of the experimental game series: a revolutionary game mechanic that enables rapid, unpredictable shifts in perspective. What happens when we change the lens through which we view the world? How can shifting our perspective alter the way we relate to our surroundings and to each other? Rather than seeking radical, sweeping change through traditional “revolutionary” means, we propose that change can occur situationally and continuously—by adjusting the way we see and understand things. This mechanism, applied here in a series of playful experiments, serves as both an artistic practice and a social principle. In our increasingly fragmented world, it offers a powerful tool for rethinking everything from democratic processes to environmental consciousness.

Through a self-reflexive exhibition game, the project offers an opportunity to actively participate in the unfolding experiments. Here, individuals are not passive observers but dynamic players within a fluid system of roles: whether as “involuntary” players, NPCs (non-playing characters), agents, researchers, or as curious lovers of ludic art. The exhibition blurs the lines between audience and performer, inviting participants to step into multiple roles, shifting from one perspective to another as they engage with the work. The exhibition also introduces non-human players into the role-play, expanding the concept of agency and offering a more inclusive view of interaction. These alternative modes of play, underpinned by computational neuroscience devices and techniques, transform scientific tools into artistic expressions focusing on empathy, creativity, and participation—can become vehicles for addressing ecological and social challenges.

An exhibition by the PSYCHOLUDIC / ROBOPSY researchgroup.

Artistic researchers: Thomas Brandstetter, Stefan Glasauer, Clara Hirschmanner, Margarete Jahrmann, Talos Kedl, Louise Linsenbolz, Georg Luif, Stefan Maier, ­Barbi Markovic, Max Moswitzer, Fabian Navarro, ­Thomas Wagensommerer, and Experimental Game Cultures & citizen science/student/everyday life experts.

This show is informed by the research projects: The Psycholudic Approach. Exploring Play for a viable Future (AR 787), Austrian Science Fund FWF/ PEEK. / ROBOPSY. An Artistic Exploration of Collective Memory through Role-Playing with AI Language Models (ICT23-020), WWTF Vienna Science and Technology Fund / INTRA Project NEST, by Tamás Pall, Experimental Game ­Cultures.