Nordic Larp Talks is a series of short, entertaining, thought-provoking and mind-boggling lectures about projects, ideas and design practice from the Nordic and collaborative traditions of live action roleplaying.
Mo Holkar talks about the fertile middle ground between larpwright-designed and player-designed characters; and how to empower players to make characters their own without the risk of their creativity breaking the larp.
Mo Holkar is a UK larp designer and organizer. He is an editor at nordiclarp.org, and an organizer of The Smoke: London’s International Larp Festival. As well as his own designs, he has written characters for other people’s larps ranging from Fairweather Manor to Suffragette! to Reborn.
Simon Brind is a British larp designer and academic. His PhD research “Combat Narratology: Strategies for the resolution of narrative crisis in participatory fiction,” looks at how stories emerge in larp. He has been writing larps since 1986. From 1988-2008 he was a goth/alternative DJ and club promoter. During that time he played gigs and club nights across Europe and North America.
Imagination (and cognition) is multi-sensory, and effects/is effected by the whole body. How does larp already design for the somatic experience how how can this be pushed further using somatic (body awareness/mindfulness) practices? Drawing from her background in somatic practices, mixed with a bit of brain and cognitive science, Susan will use the design and mechanics from her larp experience “Xenosomatics” as an example of the narrative and affective potentials of adapting somatic practices for larp design.
Susan Ploetz (US/DE) is an artist and somatic practitioner, conducting artistic research through somatic role play as affectual/effectual experiences. She was a lucky participant in the Larpwriter’s Summer School in 2016 and has presented work, spoken, or taught at Berliner Festspiele/Martin Gropius Bau, Universität der Künste Berlin, The Pervasive Media Studio, Sophiensaele, ABC Art Fair, Dutch Art Institute, Documenta, Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, and Performa, among other venues. She lives in Berlin.
We often talk about larp as a tool to create new relationships, but what about deepening already established ones? In this talk, Sagalinn Tangen will introduce you to the benefits of intergenerational storytelling from both a player and organiser perspective.
Sagalinn Tangen is a Swedish-Norwegian second generation larper and larp designer. She started larping a decade ago and organised her first larp at age 19. Last year she joined Avalon Larp Studio, and she is currently acting as Creative Lead for their project Tale of the North Wind.
Magic has been a part of larp from the first fantasy scenarios, but it has always been tied to complicated rule systems and communicated verbally. Jeppe & Maria Bergmann Hamming introduces a new technique developed for the larp Spellbound that gives a physical way of letting magic actually feel magical. And also holds the potential for being used to simulate physical control, domination and even abuse in a safe yet intense way. It can potentially be used in everything from Black Box larps to 360 degree costume larps.
Jeppe & Maria Bergmann Hamming are Danish larp designers and organizers. They have created scenarios since the end of the 90ies, including everything from big fantasy campaigns, vampire larps to freeform and black box games. They are behind award winning games like Sarabande and Deranged that have been played all over the world. They have also organized events like the Danish roleplaying convention, Vintersol, and have acted as headmasters of the Danish summerschool for larp designers. When they don’t travel the world setting up or playing larps, Maria is a teacher using larp as educational tool with young people and Jeppe is a sociologist working as Head of Analysis for one of Denmark’s largest advertising agencies.
Upon reading on many larpers and organizers self-reporting many instances of anxiety and stress connected to larp practice, Muriel tries to ponder about the causes of the phenomenon, whether it can be considered systemic, and if so, which strategies can we devise to alleviate the pressure of anxiety?
Muriel Algayres is a historian, teacher and researcher who has been creating larp and writing articles for 15 years. She has been running since 2016 the first French international larp Harem Son Saat, both in France and in the Czech Republic. Her short larps includes Flowers of May, Sorority and Between Limbo and the Veil. She was a guest of honor at the Smoke, contributor to the #feminism anthology, a character writer on the Suffragettes larp in Sweden in 2018, and is an administrator for Larp Women Unite France.
We wish to invite you all to this years Nordic Larp Talks hosted in Odense Denmark!
The Nordic Larp Talks have been running in conjunction with Knutpunkt since 2010. Nordic Larp Talks Odense 2019 is organised together with A Week in Denmark and Knudepunkt 2019. Hosted by Johanna Koljonen.
This event is free! The programme will start punctually at 19, so come early. Doors are open from 18.
Pro Musica Hall in Odeon Odeons Kvarter 1, 5000 Odense C
We will attempt to live stream the full event on Facebook (but in practice it always depends on internet magic on the day, sorry).
Nordic Larp Talks is a series of short, entertaining, thought-provoking and mind-boggling lectures about projects, ideas and design practice from the Nordic and collaborative traditions of live action roleplaying. Kick-start your convention with a fun night of new ideas!
Conscience was a Westworld inspired larp made by the NotOnlyLarp collective in the Southern Way style. It attempted to explore humanity, and what it means to be human, while providing an intense and realistic experience to its players which included playing heavily on violence, sexism, capitalism, and dehumanization. Exploring challenging themes in larp is nothing new, but what happens when even larp-tivism cannot stop internalized biases from impacting play in ways in which they are unintended? What can we do to challenge the internalized biases that stop us from playing the way we want, and how can we deal with the internalized biases of others that bleed into our play?
Jonaya Kemper is an American academic, writer, designer, and activist who believes that larp is a medium that can revolutionize the world by allowing us to work towards personal liberation from oppression. In addition to being a world builder and story member of the American boffer Undying, Jonaya is one of the organizers of the upcoming larp The Forbidden History, a freelance narrative writer for tabletops rpgs like John Wick Presents: 7th Seas, and is a part of the #feminism collection. Currently studying larp as a tool for self liberation in marginalized communities at New York University’s Gallatin Graduate School, Her work focuses heavily on the intersectional identities and providing diverse stories for those who rarely see themselves represented.
Stefan Deutsch is a larp game designer. For ¼ of a century he creates worlds for people to explore and to meet each other, be it development aid workers, tax accountants or experts and management. Participants in his games become Pirates in the Baltic Sea, aspects of a person committing adultery hiding naked in a cupboard or patients in a secret government lab. He mixes methods from sociodrama, Nordic Larp, freeform and other roleplaying games. In his previous role he was an IT consultant emigrating to East Africa. His newest exploit is a company specializing in larps on sailing ships. His favourite pastimes are wall climbing and board games and lives in Hamburg with his wife and two kids.
