Friday Late: Player/Performer

This Friday Late, join us as we rethink the boundaries of play, performance and spectacle with artists engaging with games and interactivity. From experimental live-coded music to improvisational comedy, live-action roleplay to cosplay drag, to the craft of professional acting in videogames, the breadth of gaming events tonight are linked by their intrinsic connection to performance. This collaboration with London Games Festival bridges the gap between innovative digital work and experimental, critical projects only possible in public, that together present the future of performance and play.

All events are free, and places are designated on a first-come, first-served basis unless stated otherwise. Filming and photography will take place at this event.

Please note if the V&A or any of the activations reaches capacity, we will allow access on a one-in, one-out basis.

#FridayLate

A

Algorave

The Grand Entrance, Cromwell Road 18.30 – 21.30

London Live Coding is a wildly experimental and fiercely inclusive collective of curious, creative coders from London and beyond, using code-based technology to create music and art in real-time, both online and in physical spaces.

@nadyaviaproxy, @jcyl.png, @abstraktor, @ladysinsemillia, @shapesandjapes_, @zhouyuyangjoey, @portal_.aura, @mikecooktookthis, @jaja.slide, @B00gg00, @brainpermusic

B

Thank Goodness You’re Here!

Medieval & Renaissance, Room 64b, The Simon Sainsbury Gallery, Level 1 Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30

Take turns to control a traveling salesman in this absurd comedy slapformer set in the bizarre Northern English town of Barnsworth. Take the time to see the sights and meet the locals, who are very eager to give you a series of increasingly odd jobs...

Yorkshire-based Coal Supper, founded by Will Todd and James Carbutt, creates playful hand-drawn games. Their debut, The Good Time Garden, launched in 2019; Thank Goodness You’re Here was a 2024 London Games Festival Official Selection.

@coalsupper

C

SlayStation

The Raphael Cartoons, Room 48a 19:00 and 20:00

Duration 30 minutes

For one night only, the V&A has downloaded the SlayStation DLC who will be presenting a cosplay cabaret showcase plus an immersive live game. Watch your favourite characters and worlds come to life around you and face their Choose Your Own Adventure story, if you dare!

SlayStation is the London night breathing life into videogames and queering them up –cosplay meets cabaret in an explosion of drag, comedy, burlesque, circus and more.

@slaystationexp

D

The Line is the Game

Room 33 Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30

A short comedy live-action role-playing game about the everyday frustration of waiting. Take a role from the ticket machine, join the line — possibly for a toilet? — and discover if how we queue forms a better story than what we’re queuing for.

Jana Romanova is an artist working with games, performance, and visual art. Through role-playing, social games, and various playful experiments, she researches liminal spaces, (in)visible systems that shape us, and what agency and care might look like when we playtest other ways of living together.

@janarom @pabgre @eeee.ppppp

E

Car Boot Casino

V&A Café – Morris room, 13a; Gamble Room, 14a; Poynter room, 15a Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30 Welcome to the Car Boot Casino. Join us for a night of homebrew card and bluffing games lovingly crafted by leading game designers. Pick a game and test your luck for a chance to win one of our authentically sourced car boot sale prizes.

Good Afternoon are a playful creative studio based in the UK. They collaborate with creative technologists, game designers and artists to craft impactful exhibitions, games and immersive experiences that bridge the real world and the digital.

@_.goodafternoon._

F
Let’s Make a Videogame Zine

Digital Studio, Learning Centre Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30

Artist Fredde Lanka invites you to our game design studio where you will become part of a videogame zine collective. Starting with pen and graph paper, design character sprites and building blocks for a virtual world – just as Nintendo did in the ‘80s. Add them to our gallery wall, digitise them in GB Studio and they will join a collective abstract world you can also play at home!

Fredde Lanka is a gay Swedish proto-bear illustrating smutty, silly comics, and videogames for the queer gamer generation who don’t read Foucault. @freddelanka

G

Videogame Acting panel

Hochhauser Auditorium, Level 1, Learning Centre 19:45 Duration 45 minutes

Join videogame actors Andrew Wincott (Baldur’s Gate 3) and Shai Matheson (Lego Batman, Wuthering Waves) for a behind-the-scenes look at the art of performance capture. This panel organised with MCM Comic Con explores how actors create compelling digital characters through movement, voice, and collaboration with technology and animation teams. From acting without physical sets to shaping emotional performances in virtual worlds, discover the skills, challenges, and creative possibilities driving modern motion capture storytelling. Hosted by Luke Winchester.

@wincottandrew

@shaimatheson

@ilikethatwookie

H

Robo Bingo

The Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre, Level 3 19:30 and 20:45

Duration 45 minutes

Bingo meets tech in Foxdog’s latest project, Robo Bingo. Their interactive take on the game is combined with robots, comedy and chaos. Take part with your smartphone!

Foxdog Studios, Lloyd Henning and Peter Sutton, are computer programmers turned live performers, creating comedy shows that put the audience in control. Their previous live show, Robot Chef, was a sell-out at the Edinburgh Fringe and had viewers cook sausage and beans by controlling a robot on their phones.

@foxdogstudios

I

Sex With Friends

Prince Consort Gallery

Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30

From the South African indie studio that developed Broforce, Gorn and Genital Jousting, Sex with Friends is a comedy game that forces you to share awkward, and intimate, virtual experiences with your friends. Imagine trying to win at sex, when the game controls like a cement truck on ice. It’s the least sexy game Freelives have ever made.

@freelives_official

J

Robot Karaoke

Photography Centre, Room 98, The Kusuma Gallery

Drop in from 18:30 – 21:30

Robot Karaoke is your opportunity to sing all-new words to classic tunes. Our songwriting system, The Weird Algorithm, searches an eclectic text catalog for phrases that match the original rhyme and metre of each line, creating lyrics that have never been sung before and will never be sung again.

Jamie Brew is a comedy writer, comedy musician and very serious computer programmer. He writes for The Onion, was the head writer of ClickHole and cofounded Botnik, an art tech group devoted to absurdly small language models.

@jamieabrew

Cover Artwork

Cover image credit:

Photo by Mike Cook

Credits

Curator: Susie Buchan, Independent Curator and Producer @susepicious With Kristian Volsing, Senior Curator, Contemporary Programme Lead Producer: Faunsia Tucker Producer: Katya Spiers

Supported by London Games Festival

Keep In Touch

vam.ac.uk/fridaylate

Visit vam.ac.uk/signup and subscribe to our e-newsletters featuring exhibitions, events and special offers.

[instagram & tiktok logo] @vamuseum

[facebook logo] victoriaandalbertmuseum

@V_and_A

View photos of Friday Late on flickr.com/photos/fridaylate/