Pawns of Furthest East
Pawns of Furthest East
Pawns of Furthest East (2019) is a video work set in a speculative environment where everyday life is structured by game mechanics and digital systems. The narrative unfolds in “Furthest East”, a fictional zone emerging from a system error, where visible rules dissolve while new ones operate implicitly.
The work follows characters moving between reality and simulation, within a condition shaped by interfaces, scores, and invisible protocols. Behaviour appears autonomous while remaining continuously guided and recorded by underlying systems.
Through a hybrid visual language combining gaming aesthetics and speculative fiction, the video reflects on how digital infrastructures redefine agency, identity, and participation. The game becomes a condition that structures lived experience.
Matteo Messina (b. 1994, Genoa) is an artist and developer working at the intersection of contemporary art and technological systems. He is the founder of suezcanal.xyz.
His practice focuses on building systems rather than objects, investigating how protocols, interfaces, and algorithmic logics shape behaviour and social structures.
His work spans video, installation, robotics and digital environments, positioning art as an active layer within real infrastructures.