Harun Farocki’s last completed work before his death, Parallel I–IV (2012–14), is a multichannel inquiry into video-game images in terms of their evolution toward photorealism and the peculiar qualities of their simulations. Parallel is deeply connected to his substantial installation Serious Games I–IV (2009–10), an earlier work in which digital simulation is considered in relation to the conditioning, training, and posttraumatic treatment of soldiers. Parallel eschews direct address of the connection between games and the military, instead engaging in a more procedural deconstruction of the computer-generated image as a constitutive break from the cinematic. Generated elements of ingame “nature” grow increasingly more photorealist over time, yet in their algorithmic origins lack the idiosyncrasy of the natural world. This can be seen in the digitally generated waves that crash against the shore with mechanical repetition and the fields whose tall grasses sway too perfectly. A calm female voice narrates over the strange emergent images, providing a meditation of, as she puts it, “a world generated by the gaze that falls upon it”—one populated by figures who move in uncanny ways. Presented here are stills from Farocki’s philosophical investigation of the computer image, whose characteristics become most evident in their glitches, edges, and off-stage elements. In one example, the in-game camera zooms out from an intense military conflict to the urban landscape, expanding to the staging of the game space, and then back again. In another, an ocean has no depth—it is just a hollow shell floating above a great nothingness. Seemingly solid surfaces become empty from below or within. Virtual cameras penetrate apparently dense forms. Playable characters bump up against unseen barriers, pass through hedges without disturbing them, walk straight into a rockface, or inexplicably fall through the environment into pure black nonspace. Normally invisible barriers are made perceptible as a kind of mesh. The hero encounters nonhostile figures who respond like automated props and cannot be shot or struck. They are a part of the landscape. Soraya Murray

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艺术家项目：Harun Farocki's Parallel

Harun Farocki 生前最后完成的作品 Parallel I-IV (2012-14)，是对视频游戏图像的多渠道调查，探讨它们向照片写实主义的演变及其模拟的特殊品质。Parallel 与他的大型装置 Serious Games I-IV (2009-10) 有着深厚的联系，这是一项早期的作品，其中考虑了与士兵的条件反射、训练和创伤后治疗相关的数字模拟。Parallel 避开了游戏与军队之间联系的直接解决方案，而是对计算机生成的图像进行更程序化的解构，作为与电影的基本突破。随着时间的推移，游戏中“自然”的生成元素变得越来越逼真，但它们的算法起源缺乏自然世界的特质。这可以在数字生成的波浪中看到，这些波浪以机械重复撞击海岸，而田野的高草摇摆得太完美了。一个平静的女声在奇怪的浮现图像上叙述，用她的话来说，提供了一种沉思，正如她所说，“一个由凝视它产生的世界”——一个由以不可思议的方式移动的人物组成的世界。这里展示的是 Farocki 对计算机图像的哲学研究的剧照，其特征在故障、边缘和舞台外元素中最为明显。在一个例子中，游戏中的镜头从激烈的军事冲突缩小到城市景观，扩展到游戏空间的舞台，然后又回来。另一方面，海洋没有深度——它只是一个漂浮在巨大虚无之上的空心贝壳。看似坚固的表面从下方或内部变得空旷。虚拟摄像机穿透明显密集的形式。可玩角色撞到看不见的障碍物，穿过树篱而不打扰它们，直接走进岩壁，或者莫名其妙地穿过环境进入纯黑色的非空间。通常看不见的屏障被视为一种网格。英雄遇到非敌对的人物，他们的反应就像自动道具一样，不能被射击或击中。他们是风景的一部分。索拉亚·默里 通常看不见的屏障被视为一种网格。英雄会遇到非敌对的人物，他们的反应就像自动道具一样，不能被射击或击中。他们是风景的一部分。索拉亚·默里 通常看不见的屏障被视为一种网格。英雄会遇到非敌对的人物，他们的反应就像自动道具一样，不能被射击或击中。他们是风景的一部分。索拉亚·默里