Hello

Welcome to Arcade. I’m Virgil Adams, one of the Playbeards. We’re an art-science collective, rather hard to describe, but I’m here to outline our aim for this initial residency at BAC and what we are asking you to do. I’m a scientist; forgive me then if this opening statement values clarity over poetry.

We ask for your help in exploring the Arcade. In one sense, you are our experimental subjects: we want to see how you respond to the Arcade as we represent it in various spaces. In another sense, you are our fellow experimenters: because of course, ultimately, our experimental subject is the mysterious underground place which appeared and disappeared in 1983, dubbed the Arcade by Professor Robert Sherman. Professor Sherman generously made available copies of reports and documentations by the original investigative team; it is partly from these that we now reconstruct the Arcade. We hope with your help that we may get closer to understanding the seemingly inscrutable mystery of the Arcade.

More information on the history of the Arcade will soon be available here.

We are reconstructing the Arcade in various spaces, several virtual and (at least) one real-world. This last real-world space is fittingly the Basement of BAC.

There are slots available to enter the Basement every 15 minutes between 5pm and 10.30pm on Friday 23rd and Saturday 24th May. You will enter and explore the Basement alone.

But you will need a password to purchase the ticket for any particular Basement slot. You will be given this password only after successful exploration of a number of the virtual spaces, which will be accessible online in advance of your visit to BAC.

So. Rather comprehensive but I hope clear instructions follow on clicking here.

As you will see, the first step is to email pencilling@playbeards.info with your choice of slot.

Thanks for your interest.

Yours faithfully,

Virgil Adams