episode 1 : 'free play' by Afghan skater kids and you
episode 1 : 'free play' by Afghan skater kids and you

We have chosen to live in a culture based on protestant work ethics, where there is a clear binary distinction between work and play; a deterministic culture that believes the advance of humanity lies solely in industrial and technological progress. In the field of design, we aim for maximum productivity but we never stop to ask: Do these resulting efficient systems add to our leisure time to allow us a more ludic life experience, or do they save us just enough time to stick in yet another quick work task? Play and the irrational are not very welcome unless they are highly systematized or experienced in the form of dehumanizing games where we have missions that need to be fulfilled on the way from point A to point B; no drifting, no reverie. Can play and the geist of childhood survive under these circumstances?

An extreme visual trope that illustrates a positive answer to this question is of the kids who keep playing despite the harshest conditions, kids who reclaim spaces damaged by war and global conflict as their ‘play place.’ Kids from Kabul, Afghanistan have depicted what play, skating and life means to them in drawings for the first prototype. What if these drawings and other images of play and childhood haunted the city dweller, fused into her life in unexpected situations?..

The memes of a ‘global village’ or each of us being a node on a ‘giant connected network’ are arrogant and utopian at best. Most issues and people are underrepresented and have weaker connections, if connected at all. Could new media’s role be to connect those who are not, to those who are ‘connected?’ Could this type of publishing and media distribution be applied to encourage active political and cultural engagement? To create awareness of underrepresented populations in the network and foster real opportunities for them?


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