October 25 (Sat) – November 16 (Sun), 2025
Hours: 12:00 – 20:00 Closed: Wednesdays and Thursdays Admission: General ¥1,000 / University Students ¥800 / Free for high school students and younger / Free admission for one accompanying person with a disability certificate Co-organizer: Yokohama Sports and Culture Bureau Support: Nomura Foundation, Kanagawa Prefecture MAGCUL
Organized by: NEW
Under Commons is an exhibition curated and selected by Ginga Kondo and Rin Takashima, introducing video games in a playable form.
When we hear the term “video game,” what often comes to mind is a vast global industry—one that continues to expand each year. Yet the works gathered here are small in scale, personal in nature, each engaging with highly specific themes.
This context emerges from a shift in the conditions of production: the evolution of game engines—development environments that allow individuals or small teams to create their own games. Of course, such attempts existed even before the emergence of modern engines, but these tools have dramatically increased creative freedom. The rise of digital distribution platforms has further accelerated this process, enabling a far greater diversity of works to be seen.
Still, to describe these simply as “personal games” would fail to capture the intricate contexts, structures, and backgrounds from which they arise. These are games made to respond to concrete questions about the worlds their creators and communities inhabit. Games made to explore one’s own existence. Games made to survive—and to bear witness; to articulate desire; to safeguard and sustain communities; to imagine futures and remember pasts. This exhibition centers on the specificity of the questions and themes that each game presents, and on the rich insights that emerge from them.
The title Under Commons takes inspiration from the manifesto of the same name by Fred Moten and Stefano Harney, as well as by Jack Halberstam’s The Queer Art of Failure, which engages with their ideas. In an era when the university and the state form a complicit alliance to monopolize knowledge production in the public sphere, how might knowledge generated by the oppressed—the understructure of those exploited within the system—destabilize the whole order of production? How might a “revolution” in knowledge production become possible?
In resonance with these questions, the exhibition takes up and extends the concept of “knowledge production,” reinterpreting it through the medium of video games. Here, video games are positioned as a distinctive technique of knowledge production that challenges dominant modes of producing knowledge.
Reflecting this belief, the exhibition’s main visual, created by artist Mai Endo, depicts the central characters from the five featured games transcending their respective worlds to gather in a single shared space.
（Ichiro Fujimoto）
Schedule: October 25 (Sat) – November 16 (Sun), 2025
Hours: 12:00 – 20:00
Closed: Wednesdays and Thursdays
Venue: Art Center NEW (B1F, Shin-Takashima Station, Minatomirai Line)
Admission: General ¥1,000 / University Students ¥800 / Free for high school students and younger / Free admission for one accompanying person with a disability certificate
Organizer: Ongoing Association
Co-organizer: Yokohama Sports and Culture Bureau
Support: Nomura Foundation, Kanagawa Prefecture MAGCUL
Guest Curator / Selector：Ginga Kondo, Rin Takashima
General Curator：Ichiro Fujimoto
Design：Mai Endo
Analgesic Productions LLC, © 2014-2025 SUKEBAN GAMES, © npckc. All rights reserved., 月刊湿地帯, Nuki and Sune characters from Milky Way Prince – The Vampire Star © Lorenzo Redaelli, Published by Santa Ragione
1 Enjoy the Diner (2023, Gekkan Shitchitai)
2『Sephonie』（2022 Melos Han-Tani,Marina Kittaka）
3『Milky Way Prince-The Vampire Star』（2020 EyeGuys,Lorenzo Redaelli,”Published by Santa Ragione”）
4『VA-11 Hall-A:Cyberpunk Bartender Action』（2016 Sukeban Games）
5『A HERO AND A GARDEN』（2022 npckc）
6『Caper in the castro』（1989 CM Ralph ）
The world’s first LGBTQ+ game, Caper in the Castro (1989, CM Ralph), is available to play in the free space!
This groundbreaking game has never been played in Japan before—don’t miss your chance to experience it!
●Opening Party
For the opening of this exhibition, from 5pm to 8pm, we will be having a little for the celebration. We will have snacks and drinks. Anybody can come to visit so please join us !
Dates：25th October（Sat）
Time：17:00-20:00
※This exhibition is supported by Kanagawa prefecture MAGCUL Promotion Grant
