Zero Recoil Damage

“If you don’t like how the table is set, turn over the table.” — Frank Underwood

The Modern Language Experiment was excited to respond to the Folkestone Triennial 2017 theme of Double Edge. In conversations with curator Lewis Biggs, it was clear that the theme, while open to interpretation, deliberately reflected the time, place and context in which this edition of the Triennial was shown.

In the popular Pokémon game series, the term Double-Edge refers to a move a player can use to defeat an enemy while incurring personal damage. There are many variations of this move: reckless, life-risking tackles that also cause severe harm to the user. A Pokémon wearing a Rock Head helmet, however, is protected and incurs no damage from the move.

What happens when this mentality is taken out of a computer game and placed into the real world? Can we see its effects in political events such as Brexit or Trump’s electoral win? Citizens voting for these results understood, on one level or another, the self-harm that would be inflicted but considered it a price worth paying. The Rock Head might be the protection found in numbers and, rightly or wrongly, the belief in belonging to a new alternative — or a desperate and aggressive attempt to relinquish the reality in which they found themselves.

What, then, is the cost of these moves upon our complicated and fragile social and political realities? How are they affected and effected by reckless, self-motivated actions?

While it would be simplistic to draw a direct correlation between computer games and the real world, echoes of common human behaviour can be found in the way both challenge and rewrite realities in their own image. TMLE sought to counter the Double-Edge and Rock Head move by challenging the notion that choices are binary and easily categorised. Choices should instead be debated and challenged, because recoil damage will always be present, whether Rock Head exists or not. The project critiqued ideas of alternative pasts and futures, exploring a multitude of tonal ranges to encourage discussion, thought and debate.

Zero Recoil Damage was realised through two film screenings and a publication. Screening One featured Helen Knowles, Katharine Fry, Keh Ng, Matthew Stock and Tina Hage. Screening Two featured Keh Ng, Matthew Stock, Michelle Deignan, Patrick Goddard, Tina Hage and Warren Garland.

The publication featured the voices of the artists in the screenings alongside invited guests and was available free on both screening days.