Jim West On Chess: King Me

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

King Me

Ryan Roa, an artist based in the New York/New Jersey area, is creating three handmade chess boards, out of plywood and 2x4's, that will be displayed as part of an interactive installation King Me. Viewers will be able to sit and engage in games of chess throughout the duration of the exhibition. The installation will be be a part of the Red Badge of Courage ReVisited exhibition, sponsored by the Newark Arts Council, curated by Omar Lopez-Chahoud, at 570 Broad Street, 9th Floor, Newark, NJ, running from October 26-November 30, 2008, opening Sunday October 26th from 6-8 p.m.

The last two days of the exhibition (November 29th and 30th), an open tournament will be held and played on the three boards, where a small cash prize will be awarded to 1st through 3rd place winners. In addition, each winner will also receive one of the three chess boards as a plaque. For further information or to sign up for the tournament, please visit http://www.ryanroa.com/kingmeinformation.html.

"My study of chess was accompanied by a strong attraction to music, and it was probably thanks to this that from childhood I became accustomed to thinking of chess as an art, and have never regarded it as anything else, for all the science and sport involved in it. And, moreover, an art which in some ways is closer to music than it is customary to think. Perhaps chess and music are drawn together by laws of harmony and beauty which are difficult to formulate and difficult to grasp, or perhaps by something else." - Vasily Smyslov