'Momentum' showcases young Oklahoma artists

“I think video games work well for satire — or can work well — first all, because they're so appealing. It's sort of a nice way to package up one of these ideas that's otherwise complex or hard or depressing or kind of frustrating to think about,” he said.

“It can get you playing as this rich person or this drone pilot in a flippant or kind of trivial way. I think it makes you perform this action ... because it's a game and, you know, you gotta get the most points. But then hopefully at some point you're thinking ‘What is the ethics of what I'm actually performing here?' That, I think, is how a lot of satire functions.”

One of the three Spotlight artists at this year's “Momentum: Art Doesn't Stand Still,” Kaney, 23, of Norman, has created three arcade-style games with pointed social messages: “Trickle Down,” in which wealthy executives try to stay rich by catching falling bags of money; “Drone Strike,” a “scrolling shooter” game in which users pilot an unmanned military drone but the instructions are on a different screen from the action; and “Made in China,” an “exercise in monotony” in which players portray a young assembly line worker and repeat the same button presses to manufacture consumer electronics.

“I think that artists are really only now kind of figuring out some of the potential here,” the Tahlequah native said. “I'm dealing with all the same considerations as a big video game studio: I am interested in how the graphics look, I'm interested in the game play and all of that. But my motives are definitely different, and I think that bears out in the final piece.”

Youth showcase

In its 12th year, “Momentum” features works by Oklahoma artists ages 30 and younger. It is one of the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition's biggest events of the year.

“It's the only program that we have that is specifically for young artists and that was created out of a need that we saw for young artists to gain some experience showing their work,” said Kelsey Karper, the coalition's associate director.