Coded Secrets

• New Media Caucus: Curator / Board Member
• UNARTE: Art Department Lecturer
• Ph.D. Curation and Display of Interactive New Media Art, University of Sunderland, UK
• Universidad de las Americas Puebla: Design & Art History Lecturer
• TATE Liverpool: Internship in Public Programmes / Liverpool biennial 2014
• M.A. Art History and Curating, Liverpool Hope University, UK
• Norwich Castle Museum: Curator’s Assistant for the exhibition Hubert Duprat: Caddis Crystal Company
• Museum of East Anglian Life : Work Placement — Collections Management and Curation
• Cultural Consultant for the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts Day of the Dead celebrations
• M.A. Museum Studies, University of East Anglia, UK
• Bachelor in Information Design, Universidad de las Americas Puebla, MX

• G. Cepeda, Rene, Chaz Evans, Marìa Luján Oulton, Tim Kwasny, and Tiffany Funk, eds. Video Game Art Reader: Volume 5: Game Arts Curators Kit. Vol. 5. Video Game Art Reader. Chicago: Amherst College Press, 2024. doi:10.3998/mpub.14371652.
• G. Cepeda, Rene and Salazar Constanza. “Header/footer gallery: creating and sustaining an online only art gallery”, Edited by Karin DeWild. Internet Histories, 2023, doi: 10.1080/24701475.2023.2249363
• G. Cepeda, Rene, and Chaz Evans. “To Craft a Game Arts Curators Kit: A Collective Record of How to Publicly Exhibit Video Games Around the Globe.” In Playful Materialities: The Stuff That Games Are Made Of, edited by Benjamin Beil, Gundolf S. Freyermuth, Hanns Christian Schmidt, and Raven Rusch. transcript Verlag, 2022. doi:10.1515/9783839462003.
• “Making a Manual: The Manual for the Curation and Display of Interactive New Media Art.” Edited by Pau Alsina, Irma Vilà, Susanna Tesconi, Joan Soler-Adillon, and Enric Mor. ISEA2022 Barcelona Proceedings. POSSIBLES 27 International Symposium on Electronic Art. Barcelona, 10-16 June, 2022., June 2022. https://openaccess.uoc.edu/handle/10609/147563.
• G. Cepeda, Rene, and Chaz Evans, editors. Game Arts Curators Kit. 2021
• “A Manual for the Display of Interactive New Media Art.” 2020, https://inmamanual.wordpress.com/.
• The Curation And Display Of Interactive New Media Art: Making A Manual. University of Sunderland, 20 Sept. 2020.
• “Rescuing New Media Art from Technological Obsolescence.” DAT Journal 4, no. 3 (December 6, 2019): 37–46. doi:10.29147/dat.v4i3.145.
• Towards the Meta Museum. University of East Anglia, 2011.
• “Reconciling Art History and Video Games.” The Journal The Journal of of Media Arts Media Arts and Practice, vol. 1, 2015, pp. 6–13.

Teaching Concept
Students do not need to be told what to think or do, but rather they require assistance in cultivating their natural curiosity and help in identifying their strengths and weaknesses. As an professor of art history and new media art, it is my obligation to aid students to make the most of their degrees whether they chose to remain in the arts of pursue a different path. For this reason my teachings both in practical exhibition design, art making and art history seek to develop interdisciplinary skills and the ability to identify areas where their skills can also be applied.

My teaching philosophy is deeply rooted in inclusivity, empathy, and the pursuit of justice, aiming to foster transformative education that empowers students and uplifts marginalized communities. Grounded in the belief that education is a catalyst for societal change, I prioritize creating an environment where every student’s unique perspective is not only heard but celebrated. Through a student-centered approach, I act as a facilitator of knowledge, encouraging exploration, questioning, and critical engagement with the subject matter while promoting diversity and inclusivity.

• Redefining Performance Spaces for Virtual Worlds: Exploring Games and Beyond, G. Cepeda, Rene, PdBA’s Digital Spatialities programme, funded and supported by the República Portuguesa – Cultura / DGARTES – Direção-Geral das Artes., Portugal/Karlsruhe (online)
• Walled Gardens and Wild Artists, G. Cepeda, Rene, Constanza Salazar, CAA 113th Annual Conference, New York, USA
• 8th Festival United for the Arts, Escuela de Arte de Tlaxcala , Mexico
• “Visiting Lecture, Wofford College, Department of Art & Art History, Sponsored by the Center for Innovative Learning”, USA

Main research interests

My research focuses on the intersection between curation, exhibition design and memory making in interactive new media art. As interactive new media often challenges established knowledge in the aforementioned fields, it is necessary to create new knowledge that allows for a more inclusive, interactive and reactive artform that resists conservation efforts and the removal of audience participation in artworks.

Other research interests of mine include art video games, ar, vr and the expressive opportunities offered by these new art forms.

Technonecromancy (Rene G, Cepeda & Constanza Salazar)

New Media Artifacts live a double life, as actively changing and evolving media while they remain activated and as a memory of their old selves when deactivated. Deactivation occurs due to a variety of factors which include hardware and software obsolescence, lack of support, irreparable damage, copyright and legal issues, and the death of its creator(s). This chapter aims to initiate the discussion as to what is to be done to works that are beyond the reach of traditional conservation methods. These are the works that no longer have a guiding hand that can shape their future. It is in these cases that the task falls to conservators, curators, and institutions, in general, to intervene and reactivate their function and meaning.

This chapter departs from strictly materialist or ecological understandings of media and their assemblage relations such as by Friedrich Kittler (1997), Matthew Fuller (2005), Jane Bennett (2009), and Jussi Parikka (2015). Grounded in texts by Georgia Smithson (2019), Richard Rinehart and Jon Ippolito (2014), Julia Noordegraaf et al. (2013), Annet Dekker (2014), and Rhizome’s Net.Art Archive this chapter will attempt to solve questions surrounding the work’s materiality, poetics, and fixity in time. Current conservation methods have not adapted to New Media artifacts’ dynamic nature. Following three case studies including Nam June Paik’s TV Cello (1971), JODI.org (1995), and Gilbertto Prado’s Desertesejo (2000), technonecromancy offers a new path forward where the work can be brought back to life, departing from its primary form, to preserve its artistic intentions. 

This chapter approaches artifact deactivation from an ontological and material perspective. What does it mean for an artwork to become deactivated? Has it reached the end of its life and moved into an afterlife where only its memory and physical form remains? Or can it be given, metaphorically, new life through conservation methods? What are the ethics of such technonecromancy? Can an artwork be separated from its materiality, a ghost without a shell? And in this way preserve it? Or should we allow them to pass along and remember them through the remaining memories created during their life?

Game Arts Curators Kit

The Game Arts Curators Kit—GACK—was conceived during the first meeting of GAIA (Game Arts International Assembly) in November 2019, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. With the collaboration of various experts in the field, we created a resource for game exhibition organization, design, and curation.

The document and its ongoing wiki will serve as a statement of purpose and consultation for curators, producers, and institutions involved in video game curation and event organization. This document will also serve as a guidebook and networking tool for those who want to get involved in the field of video game exhibition and event coordination.

The collective authorship of this document represents the collaboration of practitioners directly involved in this movement. In comparing our experiences during the Game Art International Assembly (GAIA) Symposia held in 2019 and 2021, we found that similar models supporting the development and exhibition of video games within local and regional communities have organically developed in different parts of the world. The events, organizations, and other support structures created by the individuals in this group realized their participation in an international game art network. Though it’s still in a nascent stage, we recognize that the support of such a network provides an infrastructure critical in developing and maturing creative media.

This toolkit is an attempt to document at least a portion of the collective experience of this group to share it broadly with other video game curators and organizers or those who may consider joining our international network. Though our individual missions may vary, our collective goal is to strengthen and broaden this global support network for current and future members. While one group has defined the initial goals of organizing games in public, these goals will shift and evolve after you, the reader, define your own.

The Manual for the Curation and Display of Interactive New Media Art

My PhD research was focused on the creation of a manual that could respond to the specific needs of interactive new media art in the field of exhibition curation and its overlap with other processes of curatorial practice, conservation and memory making. The manual is the result of a three year international research project that allowed me to survey the techniques and methodologies of academics from the Americas and Europe in order to develop a manual aimed at non-specialized museum professionals looking to curate interactive new media art.