Game On: 50 Years of Video Games Exhibition at Fundación Canal Madrid

The largest international exhibition on video game history, 'Game On', has arrived at Fundación Canal in Madrid, covering the period from 1972 to 2020. Originally launched in 2002 by the Barbican Centre in London, the itinerant project has been expanded to fit the 2,500 square meters of the historic water deposit turned exhibition space. The show features over 400 historical pieces, including more than 150 fully functional original games, each with its own station and controls. Curated by Patrick Morran, associate curator at the Barbican Centre, the exhibition is organized chronologically across fifteen thematic sections, tracing the development of video games from early prototypes by US university computer groups in the 1950s and 1960s, through the flop of 'Computer Space' (1971), to the rise of iconic characters like Pac-Man, Super Mario, Pikachu, and Lara Croft, and culminating in virtual reality with Oculus Quest. The exhibition also highlights the Spanish video game industry, featuring titles such as 'Gris' by Nomadas Studio, 'RiME' by Tequila Works, and 'Castlevania: Lords of Shadow' by MercurySteam. The show concludes with Daniel Canogar's installation '8 bit and 1/2' (2015), which repurposes hundreds of destroyed Game Boy units into a dynamic light projection table. Spain is the fourth largest video game market in Europe and ninth globally, with annual revenues exceeding €1.6 billion. The exhibition runs until May 31, 2020.