NippleGate, The Sequel

Imagine this. For SL6B the Vatican decides to build a copy of the Sixtine Chapel and the Raphael Rooms, some of the most famous parts of the Papal castle in Vatican City.

You remember the Vatican. The people that brought us the Index, the Inquisition, the ban on anything remotely sexual apart from making little Catholic kids for your friendly neighbourhood priest to lay his grubby hands on. The Vatican, where you can’t enter unless you adhere to a dress code which makes our PG standard look positively pornographic. That place full of men and women who can’t have sex, cringe at the mentioning of the very word sex, and eternally try to meddle in the sexual habits of all of us. Oh yes, and the Pope lives there, too.

Imagine that Vatican setting up a display on the SL6B sim, next year. I’d love to see that, really I would. I would hang around from the moment Father Benedict or Giovanni rezzes his first prim until after Sister Augustina textures the last corner of the last piece of furniture. Hell I’d help them build it if it means I get to see what happens next: some Linden idiot stepping in to sanitize the build.

Oh and if you think I am overstating my case, have a look at the Gorean exhibit in SL5B (direct teleport link). This time maybe it was Mullah Linden to halt the pernicious exposure of a virtual boob? I mean, what’s stricter than the Vatican? I think the answer to that question points in the direction of Teheran. Or San Francisco…

Raphael, Adam and Eve (1508), fresco in the Stanza della Segnatura, one of the Raphael Rooms (detail).

(SL is a trademark of Linden Research, Inc)

High Art in the High Alps

Granted, I have special feelings for Neufreistadt. Here’s a sim that’s not a mall, not a tropical island, not rife with casino’s, clubs, and camping chairs, but a labour of love. Recreated in prims and textures, positioned high above ground level, lies a Bavarian mountain village which looks stunning, even through the eternal mist.

Neufreistadt is run democratically by it’s Residents (as part of the CDS, the Confederation of Democratic Simulators), and maybe that’s why it has taken two years to erect and open a Museum of Contemporary Art (MoCA) there. A long wait, but one which proves well worth it.

The museum, with art exhibits on three floors and on the roof, rises high above the village center and is of a surprisingly modern architectural design. The visitor is told how to switch off the eternal mist, permeating even the buildings on the mountain, in order to get a clear view of the art. Apart from the paintings and sculptures you will find a video, two paintings with attached sound, and a spectacular kinetic installation on the roof which is also fully interactive. This installation by Adam Ramona invites to play with the different possibilities: you are invited to jump on it - don’t try this in the Guggenheim or the Louvre!

Curator Delia Lake and enthousiast TOPGenosse Brouwer have really put together a museum of considerable worth with a well-balanced and harmonious collection of interesting artwork from across Second Life.

Adam Ramona’s spectacular rooftop installation

“Robobirth” by Starax Statosky, in front of “Will I Dream?” by Tremali Lightworker

First floor with visitors (yes, that’s me in the pinstripe)

The Neufreistadt Museum of Contemporary Art, rising high above the village