XYZ

Overview

Eduardo Navarro is interested in social organisation and alternative intelligence and has worked with groups of people in spaces he creates to examine means of communication and thinking. His work XYZ (2015) is an original children’s activity that aims to reprogramme the mechanical and analytical skills used to win a game and in so doing make ‘winning’ once again a byproduct of play rather than its goal. Instead of imposing rules, the artist worked with children from local schools and clubs in Sharjah on colouring and meditation activities to develop the structure, resulting in a game that is most appropriately played with the exclusion of adults.

In XYZ, players roll an enormous ball in a gridded blue court. The ball’s movement is determined by nonvisual stimuli and guidance. The ball reveals its location by scent, sound or touch, represented by three different ‘jackets’ it wears. Each game is predetermined based on the sensory jacket used. Players, meanwhile, use applause to signal their locations on the court to each other. With its experiential, sensorial emphasis, XYZ accentuates the children’s mutual trust, concentration and collaboration.