As it marks 15 years as an arts hub, the Brisbane Powerhouse is stamping itself firmly in the digital landscape with a new festival celebrating gaming and interactive culture.
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IRL – web shorthand for "in real life" – features a retro video game exhibit, interactive art and large-scale installations, digital-inspired music and virtual reality experiences.
Artistic director Kris Stewart pointed at success stories such as QUT's Bachelor of Games and Interactive Entertainment, the State Library's digital offshoot The Edge, Halfbrick games studio and the Supanova pop culture expo as examples of why Brisbane was Australia's natural home of digital engagement.
"There's an incredibly strong digital and interactive community in Brisbane," he said.
"Brisbane by its nature is a very exuberant, forward-looking, positive, pop-culture kind of place."
He said the rapid turnover of ideas and technology in the industry meant a bigger emphasis on fresh content.
"We realised early on we couldn't just book shows six months in advance, this needed to be very contemporary and responsive," Stewart said.
"There needs to be a lot more stuff that's new, otherwise by its nature, things will have moved on."
One such project is Power Up, a huge interactive series of projections on the Powerhouse Plaza walls that will allow users to make the building run like a working powerhouse once more.
Designer Oscar Nicholson from Brisbane company Romeo said "gestural interfaces" allowed users to have digital experiences without being tethered to a desk.
"It's something I feel like people are hungry for because we're so inured to desktop, laptop and mobile experiences, and this is completely new, more expansive and always surprising," he said.
"The projection will represent a collage of mechanisms inspired by the guts of the Powerhouse, and participants will appear on screen within the mechanism, and be able to drive the gears, pistons and cogs with their arm and leg gestures."
Nicholson said he was excited to get on the ground floor with the IRL Digital Festival, predicting it had a bright future.
Stewart agreed, saying it was a chance for Brisbane to lead the pack, rather than follow Sydney and Melbourne.
"I have this great dream for a South By Southwest festival for South-East Asia that could be based out of Brisbane – we've got a lot of that already with the film festival and Asia-Pacific Screen Awards," he said.
"The interactive arts is both a creative industry but also an innovative arts practice... that's a space we can really own."
IRL Digital Festival runs from May 7 to 17 at the Brisbane Powerhouse, New Farm.
