About

The Museum that comes to You

Karen Runcell restores a damaged painting for the "358" Exhibition.

The Museum of Moving Art is a creative device, an idea and the physical expressions at the centre of a planet-wide non-commercial community art project.

In artspeak, it can be understood to be an evolving composite artwork (a work of art that is made up of other works of art). Originally conceived as "street art with theatrical tendencies", it can be played as a game, or it can be approached more seriously - simply as a rather unique form of arts museum. However, playfulness is the key, for MOMA boldly experiments with the integration of gaming into community arts practice.

More simply, MOMA is made by participants in the wikimoma.art project - it takes many forms, and it can be in more than one place at any given time.

MOMA is what you make It

As a game, MOMA is played face to face at pop-up galleries in public and community spaces, online here at wikimoma.art and also in computers as creative projects and video games (single + multi-player). Participants can play as themselves or as characters they have created - they may play roles such as curators, museum visitors, artists, benefactors, art scholars, bureaucrats, trustees and whatever else takes their fancy.

This role-play can be quite low-key: sometimes random participants visiting the Museum may not even realize that they are part of a game. It can even get quite theatrical as Cosplay. Another way of playing at MOMA is to actually to have fun helping to make the games themselves!

Inspiration, Conception & Aims

MOMA is inspired by flight simulation, buskers, street art and all of the great public art institutions in the world (but especially the Doncaster Museum & Gallery, Heide, and Buxton Contemporary).

Originally conceived as street art with theatrical tendencies, MOMA has matured into an expansive collaborative community arts project called wikimoma.art. It is interdisciplinary in nature. The main aims of the project are:

• to explore the intersections between reality, fantasy and the digital world
• to create a straight-friendly Queer space in the online gaming world and at MOMA live spaces
• to open up play in the flight simulator space to non-virtual-pilots
• to represent Queer communities as ethnic groups by highlighting their Queer cultural expressions
• to represent Queer individuals as fully functional and valued participants in the intersectional context of the broader communities in where they also live
• to develop & exploit the cinematic and dramatic potential of open-world flight simulator software, particularly in regard to non-liner story telling.
• to use online digital technologies to bring people together in real life communal spaces that are safe, playful & creative

Foundation

The Museum was founded in the Australian winter of 2021 by David Freedom Rose. It had it's first public appearance in the context of a TAFE art course run at The Youthie in Nambucca Heads, NSW, Australia. However, the earliest evidence of MOMA's development can be found in David's art journals some 5 years previously.

Acknowledgement of First Nations people

The Museum of Moving Art acknowledges Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as Australia’s First People and Traditional Custodians.. We recognise that they have a continuing connection to the land, its waters and the communities where the Museum was first developed. We pay our respects to Elders past and present, and are committed to making a positive contribution to the wellbeing of all First Nation's People world-wide by providing services that are welcoming, safe and culturally appropriate.