NGV: THE PICASSO THEFT BOARD GAME

Hey everyone. I'm gonna do a full post on the board game now that I have soo much time on my hands. :D

 So the inspiration came from some studies I did when visiting the NGV. I did a series of circulation studies. First one was my own circulation through the gallery. The next three were tours I did. What I found was that the way we moved through the gallery was quite similar but more so, the artworks that we stopped at were the ones considered 'icons' of the gallery. When I asked one of the guides, she did say that they all had a list of the more prominent artworks which they should show. From there, my tutor and lecturer said I had to go a more creative route. Haha. So the idea for the board game came about. I combined the Picasso theft which really happened in 1986 with the artworks that we stopped at. I imagined stories for the artworks, and that made up the cards-the characters, the weapons, the rooms, and the help cards which were additional artworks that did not make it into the suspects pile.

The format came from the game Cluedo. I've changed the size a little, so the whole set is about 42cm x 42cm. 

The rooms were sketched in by me and the rest of the set was laser cut. The drawing of the rooms became another method of remembering and representing the gallery because I did not use references and the artworks you do see are connected to the 'players' included in the set.

The cards: weapon, suspect, room.

I really enjoyed coming up with a story for the characters and their weapons. For example, Cleopatra's weapon is a venomous snake. Warhol has coca-cola bottles, a reference to the prints he did.

Help cards: There are 10 artworks in total but I've tried to split them into a positive + negative reading. Also, there are small captions that relate to the artworks themselves. These are two of my favourite ones. 'The Synnot Children'- I imagined them as these children who are a little cheeky and prone to hearing gossip or eavesdropping on other people's conversations. So their little caption was 'You hear the children talking about a suspicious person' with the action 'You Get To See The Card'. The other was the painting 28th Regiment at Quatre Bas which shows a group of soldiers. Their caption was 'Prepare for invasion! The Napoleon exhibition is coming to the gallery. Stand back and await orders' with the action 'You Miss A Turn'. I came up with this to coincide with the Napoleon exhibit which makes up this year's Winter Masterpieces. I sort of imagined them as gearing up for the upcoming battle which was fun.

 Here's the checklist showing the suspects, weapons, and rooms.

 While this game can be recycled with many permutations of who, where and how, I had set this up for the exhibition to be done by Balzac. Again, another layer of remembering and representing because in old photos, the statue of Balzac by Rodin was in the centre Federation Court. However, today, it has been moved to the back of the gallery, the Grollo Equiset Gardens. He is the mastermind because of the dissent he feels for once being the centre of the gallery who visitors see when entering but now, being relegated to the gardens at the back of the gallery and he feels no one respects him anymore. Then in comes the Picasso with so much publicity(good and bad) and that's unfair to him so he masterminds the theft. I don't know about the other visitors to the gallery but I never visited the garden till this year when my lecturer told me about it. I actually didn't know they had a garden.

This confession letter by Balzac is included in the safety chest with the 'answer' envelope.

Side view of the board. The little weapon totems were painstakingly sourced on eBay except for the poison ring which was my own. 

The Guide Book.

I love this page which shows the suspect line-up.

The player tokens. Silhouettes were done in Photoshop and Illustrator then laser cut.

[L-R] Officer + Susanna, Pan, Balzac, White Haired Man, Warhol, Lucrezia Borgia, Draped Seated Woman, Cleopatra.

 The front of the set shows the etching of the gallery's front facade. Again, remembering and representing the place.

 Back of the set shows the back facade.

 The left side showed some snippets of the actual ransom note. A particular one I love is the last caption. The ACT (Australian Cultural Terrorists) who were the actual thieves sent a burnt match with a note saying "Thank you for your patience. Phase two begins shortly." Sort of a threat to say, meet our demands or the Picasso goes up in flames. I've shown the frame of the painting with a registrar's card saying 'Removed to the ACT' which was the source of confusion. The theft was done on a Saturday. The gallery didn't notice anything amiss till Monday because it looked as if the painting was on loan to the Capital Territory. Sparking theories that this was an inside job done by people who knew how galleries worked.

 This side are details of the set. 'One stolen Picasso. One casualty. Find the mastermind'. I have to explain, the casualty refers to Rachel de Ruvigny, the Countess of Southampton which is hung in the European Paintings Gallery. Her painting has a skull which means it was completed posthumously. I wanted to add in that she tried to stop the thief but got killed in the end, hence the appearance of the skull. A regret I have is that I wanted to write a background story to be included in the guide book. But lack of time and studio work getting in the way meant it could not be finished in time. I got my friend, Siaw Hui to help me out but her exams got in the way as well. So we only have 2 out of 4 chapters. Which is a shame, because Siaw Hui is an awesome writer and those were 2 really funny chapters. I've since told her that we have to finish it and I'll print the guide book with it included. Only now, we don't have a deadline. :)

The cover of the board can be removed to reveal compartments inside for the guide book, checklist, tokens etc. The game board also turns over so it becomes the cover and it has a plaque that says "The Picasso Theft" and 'National Gallery of Victoria'. I forgot to take a picture of that. 

Wow, a very long post but I loved making this board game and I'm excited to play it because I haven't tried it out yet. There were many little elements that build up the story for this board game including its presentation and I'm really happy with how it has turned out. 

Cheers! Maya and Cecil have agreed to help me test this out soon so maybe we'll post up some of that.

Duration: This has been in planning for half of the semester but the actual construction came down to about a week of little sleep and lots of hard work. The rooms themselves took me about 24 hours to draw and plan. I would have liked to have that laser etched but I didn't know how it would look yet (and had to send my job in ASAP or risk not getting it back in time) and the price would have been astronomical for laser etching. 

Material: Plywood, Brown Ink, Black Ink, Superglue and Balsa Cement, Recycled Paper(for the cards).