currently working on
Nordic/Arctic futurism projects, including a game universe, living lab and documentary film.
PhD research creation at the Technoculture, Art and Games lab (TAG), Milieux institute for arts, culture and technology at Concordia University. I am also a member of Hexagram and the Solar Media Collective.
My research focus is diverse game design, systems design for machine learning and AI generated game content, and cyborg interfaces. Research site imperceptible.space
currently featured in
Nordic landscape and biotech photo collections, available at seditionart.com/idun-isdrake
BRANDS
EXPERIENCE
Creative Director &
Game Designer
Art house to AAA, research in immersive media and metaverses, LARPs, transmedia, experience design, physical installations, character costumes, cosplay, archaeology of game culture, scientific consultation (Viking culture, story architectures etc). Game jams, esport shows, incubation/start-up support through my lab Collaboratory. Games for social innovation and learning, diversity and inclusion, HCI and cyborg interfaces. Co-initiator of IGDA Sweden, initiator of Diversi Gothenburg, advisor at Game Dev Force, and other activities for inclusive gaming. Advisor and report writer for cities interested in esports and game events.
Game Innovation
Game innovation is the favourite part of my work, from making new kinds of art house games, to building the game innovation lab Collaboratory.I was also a part of the team that developed the Electronic Arts (Battlefield, Star Wars etc.) R&D lab, Frostbite Labs/SEED, focusing on digital humans, machine learning, VR and more. My role was a mix of producer and designer, prototyping future game experiences and features for EAs games and engine. I was also leading team building activities, road mapping and brand vision workshops, managed office spaces and demo sessions, introduced Dev Days game jam, a hackathon, as well as a diversity initiative at the DICE offices in Stockholm and LA.
Film Director
Art house, music video, VR/AV/AR/MR, immersive installations, video installations, projection mapping, interactive, feature, short, web series, documentary, transmedia, commercials. I also have experience in script writing, editing, audio, producing, production design, casting, costume, mask, location scouting, photography, cinematography, mocap and light design.
I am included in the London-based body>data>space collective of pioneers in digital arts, and listed on several artist platforms like Ars Electronica Women in Media Arts
Research areas
Human Computer Interaction, cyborg interfaces, body mods and non-verbal communication. Digital skin, avatars and identity in virtual and augmented spaces. Diversity and ethics in digital domains and AI systems, counter-tactics and empowerment.
Archaeology, game culture and technological development over time.
Example of cyborg music tech, playing music or ‘singing’ through implants in the body, Test video.
Spaceship management; new business models and process, innovation for start-ups, policymakers and organisations through living labs and make/hack/game spaces like Collaboratory.
Cyborg art
A new language based on NFC implants in my hands and chest. Embodied, embedded tech for diversity, inclusion, identification in metaverses, VR and more. Body modifications as empowerment, counter tactics and anti-surveillance face mods. I work with embodiment, movement, somaesthetic design, have danced and for a while I changed the way my body runs by using a jumprunning shoe daily for over 3 years, with side effects like not being seen by automated cars trained on ‘normal’ human movement styles.
HEART
Implant under a tattoo of a cyborg heart linked to an experience when scanned with an NFC device. Explores non-verbal emotional expression and how tech can bring people closer. It is also a reminder to value the time we have, showing an cardiac ultrasonic video and countdown of my heart beats.
Diversity & Inclusion
Labs, meet-ups and consulting for diversity, inclusion and equity is an important part of my work. I run and support several initiatives in the game and tech industries, discuss cyborg rights, develop new game controllers and interfaces. See Collaboratory’s list of diversity resources here.
MUSIC TECH
I have explored music tech and made audio art with nerve signals and other types of biofeedback, and I curate, co-facilitate and direct festivals and labs for diverse tech, like Electrodome and Music Tech Fest.
I directed the MTF Lab at Slush 2017, theme: inclusion & blockchain. Including a show at the closing party of Slush Music and opening party of Slush. News broadcast Yle
Article by Gautam Dhameja.
New interfaces
Axion, a game and interactive documentary that can be played with an EEG sensor, mainly experienced as an art installation. Trailer. Initiated when game designers, film-makers and scientists gathered at CERN in Switzerland, hosted with Tribeca Film Institute, to find new ways of telling interactive stories about science. BBC story
MIT Media Lab Doc
Body Hack – film about our MTFLab Body+Performance featuring Viktoria Modesta. Made by BAFTA-winning filmmaker Sheila Hayman, produced by MIT Media Lab at Music Tech Fest Berlin 2016. I led the lab together with Peter Kirn. Artists, neuroscientists, technicians, MIT Media Lab fellows, designers and hackers worked together on technology as extension of the body. Article in Wired and summary video.
Speaker European Commission
Research & innovation – shaping our future, bringing together policymakers from EU institutions, nearly 700 stakeholders and interested actors to discuss the role of research and innovation for Europe’s future. Visionary speakers included Nobel Prize winners, captains of industry, researchers and innovators at the frontier of progress, politicians and movers and shakers in society. Live stream available here, (I talk at 11.53).
Highlights video:
Open Innovation 2.0
DIGITAL AGENDA FOR EUROPE Open Innovation 2.0 Conference 2015 – speaker, IoT thought leader.
Aalto University and Design Lab, Espoo, Finland.
Panelist
Several panels with Dreamhack and Sverok at game events. Video from Pride 2021 LGBTQIA+ Gamers
Panelist
Opening of the International Science Festival with Nobel Center 2018, panel on AI with Max Tegmark as a hologram.
Game culture talk at The Royal Dramatic Theatre Stockholm, stream link http://www.dramatenplay.se/spelkultur-och-kulturspel/
Panel on queer film at Pride 2017 Klarabiografen, Stockholm, hosted by Shortly.
Slush Music keynote, and panel on Sourcing talent to the music industry, with: Emilien Moyon, Nico Stadi, Yvan Boudillet, Derek Sellin, Jasmine Isdrake.
Music Pool Berlin: Music ideas, performance, and music technologies At Noize Fabrik Berlin, theme: How can music technologies influence your work as an artist, and how can you influence technologies to develop your style of music and your musical performance?
Speaker/Curator
Full list of talks given between 2010 and 2021 at isdrake.com/cv/
Keynote at Innovation by collaboration, SNITTS tech transfer conference.
Presentation The importance of diversity, inclusion and transdisciplinary collaboration, WASP The Wallenberg Artificial Intelligence, Autonomous Systems and Software Program
FutureFest 2018, London. Debate on augmented bodies and future humans, Isdrake, Rebecca Allen and Douglas Rushkoff, moderator Ghislaine Boddington.
Panel on transmedia at BreakIt GameTech conference 2018, Stockholm.
Presentation Digital identities & avatars, 2018 Toronto, Society for Literature, Science & Arts
Embodied Empowerment – Cyborg Implants as Musical Instruments.
Artist talk and performance at Raflost festival for electronic arts, and lecture at the University of the Arts, Reykjavik, Iceland.
Supported with a travel grant from The Swedish Arts Grants Committee.
May 2021
Shortlisted for the Science Gallery Dublin proposal workshops for the coming Bias exhibition, in collaboration with the ADAPT center.
Lead curator of the early development for the game exhibition I named Play Beyond Play. The team was Playcentric Industries, BankerWessel and Strombro Building Workshop, together with the Technology Museum Stockholm personell.
ELEKTRA, in collaboration with Hexagram – MATERIA : Laboratoire public de création de savoirs numériques. September 2022
Participated in cluster 3 at this event that brought together local and international artists, creators, scientists, researchers and professionals from the artistic and cultural sectors, in a 3 day arena of creation and knowledge sharing, at the intersections of art, design, science, and multiple forms of knowledge and forms of knowing.
Keynote StoryTech conference 2018, Gävle.
Participatory project by the dance company at the Gothenburg Opera. Creative direction in digital storytelling, 2018.
GOTHENBURG BOOK FAIR 2020
Co-curator for the digital culture track at Scandinavia’s largest cultural event. The program included many interesting talks on esports, game culture and new storytelling formats, and we invited esports-organisations like The Alliance and Female Legends, as well as politicians and researchers. Shaped together with partners like Rainy lab, Dreamhack and Storytel. I was also hosting the conversation about the esports grassroots movement in Sweden.
Augmented Authenticity
Talk and collaborative debate and interview, Chalmers University of Technology, AHA Festival 2019
Our dialogue on transformation, diversity & design fiction was also published as an article in Glänta 3/20.
Keynote Internet Days Stockholm 2017.
Co-curator/speaker, The Glass Room Experience, Stockholm 2018.
September 2019 London
Panel: Age of the heroine.
Interview on the same theme in Design week, design and representation of female characters in video games
Digital Culture – Keynote at Karlstad University 2020 with Drivhuset, UF Värmland, The Great Journey, Karlstads kommun, DigitalWell Arena. Article in Swedish
Inclusive Digital Spaces – Lecture for Halland Visualisation & Innovation Arena 2021.
Art & Exhibitions
Field_Notes – Deep Time
September 2013, a group of international artists, scientist and practitioners met for “Field_Notes – Deep Time”, an art&science field laboratory at the Kilpisjärvi Biological Station in Lapland, organized by the Finnish Society of Bioart.
Deep Time / Deep Futures – Finnish Academy of Fine Arts Helsinki. Symposium on artistic responses to the dichotomy between human time-perception and time in biological, environmental, and geological processes, within which we are embedded.
The Common Roof: Göteborgs Kollektiva Hus
Workshop at Röda sten led by artist and architect Marjetica Potrč, exploring the crossing of art, activism and urbanism. Through participatory design a group of artists were invited to build a house. The exhibition was then open for any visitor to continue building.
Urban sound
Som en satellit till Göteborgs Internationella Konstbiennal öppnar utställningen ”Älvsnabben- drömmen om ett annat Göteborg” på Sjöfartsmuseet Akvariet.
Group exhibition at the Gothenburg Maritime Museum 10/9 2011 – 8/1 2012, including live performances at Älvsnabben boat during the Gothenburg art biennial. Winner of the UEForum Golden Room award.
Idun participated with video, audio and text works. Click to read booklet.
The Spiral
Playing myself in 2 LARPs for Swedish Television and transmedia game about an artist collective. 2011-12. Lending my original art to the TV series and live events, made videos for events and social media and maintained fake social media accounts and stories for several months leading up to the TV premiere. Article
Glennville
A parody style transmedia web series about the behind, behind the scenes at a film studio. Recorded at Gothenburg Film Studios 2011-12. I worked as a transmedia director, with script development, live events and the story architecture in social media. We recorded 3 episodes and held live events and a film competition where the line between fiction and reality was blurred. A mood video can be seen at vimeo.com/35196173
Bastian
Web series and music tour for Swedish Television, by Göta Film, 2012. I worked with transmedia direction and materials for social media. The team was touring around Europe in a van, shooting the series in several locations, including live concerts and interactions with people we encountered during the tour.
MOMO
Game concept and script for 9 levels, by me and Theo Gabay, about a child trying to escape an orphanage, 2010.
Illustrations by Anders Muammar.
Audiovisual experiments
Audiovisual performance based on the Ray Bradbury novel There will come soft rains.
Audio art based on neuron signals recorded during microneurography tests at the Institute for Physiology and Neuroscience in Gothenburg.
Epic Unidragon
A game art gallery by Isdrake, initially built as a container gallery when I was asked to design a temporary part of the Gothenburg centre while construction plans were being set.
GIBCA
Invited artist at Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art (GIBCA), held every second year and has today become one of the leading art biennials in the Nordic region. Round table discussion in House of words, at Röda sten art hall.
Design for stage
I direct and produce stage shows, including digital scenography and extraordinary set/costume designs. Like Gydja, a character that involves everything from fire breathing to sensors that control projections through dance. Or this projection cube for Twisted Feet’s 5 Degrees, built in Collaboratory. I also perform with fire and have studied dance at DNA in New York and other dance studios.
Film and games festival awards & selections
IndieCade 2015, Los Angeles, Gregor.
‘We have been really impressed with your experimental film and we appreciate your original mise-en-scène that mixes the surreal and the expressionist, as well as the way you deploy elements of noir aesthetics in the service of a cinematic modernism reminding us of Guy Maddin’s Keyhole‘. Interview ISSUU.COM
Indie Gathering Film Festival, USA 2012, winner experimental shorts, Brainfuck.
Gothenburg International Film Festival 2013, selection online shorts competition, Brainfuck.
Brainfuck is a psychogeographic game, wearable art and performance project initiated in New York 2010.
Events
Urban cultural city planning
STADSMUSEET GÖTEBORG
Talk and Urban Culture Planning Lab with artists, citizens, politicians. Article.
WATER themed labs
Invited to advice on several city planning projects in Gothenburg. Älvstaden, ADA and other local organisations. Article GP. Main idea was to make the city playable when it rains and design against segregation, partly through sculptures by the tram stations, bringing people together and handling water flows.
URBAN ART & ARCHITECTURE
Participating in city planning projects and construction of public spaces. One is the award winning sauna project at Frihamnen with SBK and Raumlaborberlin.
STENKROSSEN LUND
Held a Spaceship management Ninja playshop at Stenkrossen 2015. The local community was really awesome and later they started ZON Art Lab Agency, check it out if you visit Lund. The local paper wrote an article.
Stenkrossen Lund 2019
Keynote and dance collage workshop to untangle creative knots.
FSCONS 2013-14
Ninja buildshop 2014, Rube Goldberg Ninja Turtles Challenge.
Talk on makerculture 2013 video link
Älvornas strand
Elves beach is an urban game, AR and parkour experience bringing stories of citizens to life, connected to training sculptures around the city, turning the city into a big board game. We want to use the city as a test ground for new ways to use technology to deal with issues like segregation and fear. Collaboration with athlete Samir Gadre and Stampede, and paintings by Erik Jakobsson.
Video from my research and documentary projects about parkour, based on my interest in what I call mind parkour, and psychogeography. I met runners in New York, Montreal, Gothenburg and Berlin. Linked here is also a video by Steve Zavitz showing the NYC community.
Gothenburg City Triennial
Playcentric Industries & Institute was asked to curate parts of the first Gothenburg City Triennial. We held a playshop and show together with partners and athletes from Collaboratory and Stampede, as well as singer Ida Long.
Started Diversi Gothenburg to raise awareness about the lack of diversity and accessibility in the game industry, academia and community. We held Meet-ups and gatherings regularly in different spaces and with different themes for a couple of years. Diversi is run by Dataspelsbranshen.
2016 we organised a Diversi workshop and panel at Nordic Game Conference.Was also speaking and promoting at Gothcon 2016.
Keynote, Copenhagen 2014, GameOn2014
Giving presentations on esports and game culture, and advisor on game culture and esports, working with proposals for ESL, Dreamhack, DOTA and connecting the city event organisation with gaming communities 2019.
Writing report on game related events, 2015.
IT
Process leader playshop for women in IT WinIT, at Gothia Science Park 2014. Speaker and host for the Engineers Union gathering at Collaboratory. Speaker at Compile Gbg 2014, and supporting kids code activity with Dataföreningen
Makerspaces
Collaboratory consulted many spaces in Sweden in their process of building labs and permanent and mobile makerspaces. A long list of companies (Ericsson, Volvo, Dassault systems etc), schools, universities, government orgs and unions (Business Region, VGR, Unionen, Engineers Union, Science Parks etc), and researchers came for guided tours and inspiration.
We also developed an idea about a maker car for experiential learning with the Collaboratory community, Engineers without borders and BUKE.
Reboot Stories
Creative producer at Reboot Stories and collaborator at educational projects like the story of robot Lyka that empowers students to reboot their education.
The BUKE is a people-powered bike bus that serves as the symbol of how youth drive change and progress in their community. From an idea on a napkin at Learn Do Share Los Angeles 2013, to several prototypes, to a business plan, to a youth-run cyclery: The BUKE, as envisioned and imagined by a group of former high school dropouts, is a vehicle for economic sustainability and community transformation.
Community art
Bergsjön Public, Art Marathon curated by us at Valand and San Fransisco Art Universities. Poster
Consulting / Teaching / Industry partnerships with universities
Science Parks
Norrköping Science Park/Visualiseringscenter-Keynote on makerculture, 2015. Article
Ideon Science Park – Talk on innovation and design 14 feb 2014.
Skövde Science Park – makerspace, game innovation info, 2014.
Linköping Science Park, Mjärdevi & Umeå Science Park, Sliperiet, HUMLAB – talk and processleader workshop, 2014.
TEACHING
Business Innovation at School of Business, Economics and Law, the Department of Business Administration.
Advanced Game Design at FutureGames.
Film & Games
Transmedia storytelling – lectures, workshops, examinations 2014, 2015.
STOCKHOLM GAME UNI, KISTA SCIENCE CENTER
Game innovation, AI, music tech.
Transmedia and makerspaces – guest lecturer 2014.
ZURICH UNIVERSITY OF ARTS Dep. of Film & Performing Arts. Guest lecturer on transmedia, mobile apps, augmented reality, 2011.
Story architects Collaboratory was industry partner for the Business & Design program 2014.
A group from the 2015 Business & Design program were inspired by Collaboratory and got support for holding their Future innovator lab in the space when helping the company First to know with creating a lab, The ( ) space, for students. Now they are building a makerspace in Bergsjön.
2 student groups from the Business & Design program have made their Master degree projects at Collaboratory.
This group did a nice video
LBS High School
Game design and game jam, 2015.
PRESS/INTERVIEWS
BBC story on the CERN Tribeca hack where our game Axion was initiated bbc.com/news/tech
Femhype
“Blanket Fort Chats” is a weekly column featuring women and nonbinary game makers talking about the craft of making games. In this week’s post, we feature Jasmine Idun Isdrake, a game and experience designer.
Filmteractive
Filmteractive 2014 video https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=172&v=sbxf3aiGOk8
and publication Filmteractive-projekt-1.12.2014
LEVEL wrote about the underground game culture in LA, Tokyo and Gothenburg, and about the work Collaboratory does to support the indie devs.
PING 2014
Article about projects developed at Collaboratory
http://dp.hpublication.com/publication/637faf8a/
Thesis by A. Stehn researching spaces like Collaboratory.
A_Stehn_Transition Hub
Interview at German Radioeins / Strom und Drang, by Dennis Kastrup, about my cyborg art. www.radioeins.de
Svenska Dagbladet
Game reviews
Listed games that are not the mainstream or AAA kind that people usually write about in this section www.svd.se
Article and news broadcast by Yle https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-9953104
SVT interview about a stunt course for driving and proper police acting for the film industry.
Articles about Art & Game Obstruction exhibition 2015
zenitkultur.com
sverigesradio.se
PUBLICATIONS
Learn Do Share
Fieldbooks capturing design and storytelling experiments at our global Learn Do Share events www.learndoshare.net
Film and game scripts
Available on request, film list storyarchitect.se/productions
Make Change Kitchen
Blogg and magazine made at Collaboratory until 2015. Some themes can be seen at the early Collaboratory blog, a new form of living lab and publication of research, CSR/ASR and open innovation.
The Collaboratory Playbook collaboratory.se/playbook/
Art & Game Obstruction
Anthology, game course Skövde University and exhibition at Skövde Art Museum 2015. Authors: Lars Kristensen, Ewa Mazierska, Graeme Kirkpatrick, Lissa Holloway-Attaway, Jenny Brusk, Thomas Oldrell, Olle Essvik, Benjamin Fallon, Robert J. Homewood, Marisa Tapper, Karin Ryding, Mathilda Bjarnehed, Jasmine Idun, Dev Karnal Fridén, Ossian Borén, Jenny Sörensen, Berith Stennabb, Iman Farhanieh, Carlos González Díaz, Minnamari Helmisaari