Pittsburgh art gallery turns its physical space into a digital den

Amid the coronavirus lockdown, most museums and art galleries have turned to virtual experiences. But one Pittsburgh art outlet has taken things a bit further — digitizing its entire physical space.

LikeLike, on North Evaline Street in Garfield, is a gallery launched in February 2018 devoted to art as told through video games.

It’s kind of like if a video arcade of the 1980s met up with The Andy Warhol Museum — but instead of Pac-Man and Dig-Dug, game programmers have a higher message.

“LikeLike is a space for independent games and playable arts,” Paolo Pedercini, the gallery’s executive director, said at a November conference in Buenos Aires.

Of course, with physical interaction such a vital part of LikeLike’s nature, current social distancing edicts create some obvious issues. But this situation seems almost tailor-made to LikeLike’s mission. Why not take something based in the digital realm into … the digital realm?

And so, LikeLike Online was born.

According to the site, it’s “the tiniest MMORPG” (“massively multiplayer online role-playing game”).

Launched on Friday, the site is a virtual representation of the Garfield garage that houses the actual gallery. Click into the site (no admission charge), enter a username and pick your avatar (body and colors). Once inside the pixelated world, you are free to play any of six games or just hang out and mingle with your pixelated pals.

The show: “An Itsy Bitsy Crisis,” a selection of works about crises and rebirths. The exhibit — with titles like “The Last Human Touch,” “Continental Drift” and “Spiral House” — features works by Sophie Houlden, Cecile Richard, porpentine charity heartscape, Withering Systems, Pol Clarissou and Cephalopodunk.

Even though the exhibit’s opening night was online, Pedercini says it felt like normal.

“The opening was loud and crowded like the real events,” he says, “more random internet people than locals, obviously. In the following days, it has been chill, a few hundred visitors a day just dropping for a little bit.”

The games — each of which are heavy on the art and light on play — are made through Bitsy, a tool created by Adam Le Doux. According to LikeLike’s site, “In recent years the Bitsy scene has produced a myriad of playable zines, confessional pieces, minimalistic adventures, and interactive poems. Playing and making Bitsy games is a perfect activity for a long day in quarantine.”

Oh, don’t forget to check out the backyard, where Harvey the dog hangs out.

Taking the gallery into a digital concept was something Pedercini anticipated.

“I am originally from Italy and, following the situation there, I knew early on that the restrictions were going to happen here, too,” he says.

“In game communities, we are already familiar with remote practices and tools, from streaming to online games. So, it made some kind of sense.”

“Crisis” is set to run through April. LikeLike’s normal schedule sees new shows open on the first Friday of the month, in line with Penn Avenue’s monthly Unblurred gallery crawl.

But don’t worry, Pedercini says the online gallery should continue.

“The idea is to keep it up, continuously or not, until the quarantine is over and we resume physical programming,” he says.

Ultimately, Pedercini says the goal of LikeLike is to have playable artwork expand the boundaries of the standard gallery experience.

The limit for that seems virtually endless.