A Mii Portrait by Cindylu

While I was in Los Angeles last week I spent two days digging in the scene with my good friend (and one of my favorite art subjects) Cindylu. I had such a great time with her trying to define the difference between being an aesthetically dedicated Chicano and self-parody. While we waited to see a midnight show of Watchmen, Cindylu brought out her Wii for us to go head-to-head in a couple of games of Mario Kart and Wii Sports.

Before we began playing she showed me her rogues gallery of Miis that she had created or downloaded. Her Miis were of family and close friends and when she offered do create a portrait of me in Mii form I was honored and couldn’t resist. Our roles were suddenly reveresed and I was the subject and she the artist. I was highly amused with the results, especially after seeing the Miis in action while we played against each other. The artistic process is documented below.

This may seem like fun and games but video game portraits are no joke. There was a recent exhibit at SOMArts of avatar based art. Included in the exhibit were four self-portraits by artist Marque Cornblatt that he created from X-Box 360 games with create-a-character features. He presented them on monitors embedded in gold-trimmed frames and hung them on the gallery walls like paintings. The effect was impressive, an animated self-portrait in the guise of traditional flat visual art.

For the record, Cindylu schooled me in every Wii game we played. She knocked me out twice in wii boxing and among other humiliations. I’d say more but my nerd status would be revoked. I need to get a Wii quick to work on my mad skills.