In a suburb in Sweden there was a pink culture house that was about to be demolished in 2009. Earthlings were sad to close the house down, but it was poisonous, so they had moved their events outside since long. In the house there had been a little beetle left by itself, abandoned for many months, maybe years.
Close to the culture house is a beautiful forrest where many beetles live. Since the paleolithic, beetles have been important symbols of renewal as they are holometabolistic. They go through a complete metamorphosis from larva to adult, can be found in almost all habitats and they are the animal group with most described species.
One day the beetle stumbled on a hidden piece of art in the house. It was a knitted gasmask. The beetle put the mask on and the ease of breathing gave it strength to crawl out from the house. It barely made its way into a gallery across the street, leaving a trace of blood all the way. An artist followed the red line and recognized their old gasmask, they named the beetle Gregor after a character in Kafka’s The Metamorphosis.
Gregor moved to the artists game lab Collaboratory where they met Bitslap who made games too. They decided to give Gregor a digital self.
Gregor met lots of people in the lab and in festivals around the city.
In 2015 Collaboratory had to move out from the old space so Gregor was moved to the Epic Unidragon game gallery. A space where artists from all over the world are welcome to exhibit their playable art.
Encountering so many people from different cultures made Gregor curious about the rest of the planet. Gregor decided to travel across the world.
The festival IndieCade15 in Los Angeles accepted the game. Disguised as a mummy Gregor made it all the way to LA.
Saturday Oct 24 Gregor is at IndieCade Night games. Come and play, and if you want, help build their new body. A metamorphosis has started, Gregor is about to get a new look to fit the next journey, on a rocket to space!
