Notes from an exhibition - Timeless strategy classics

 

Long before the age of cardboard and printing, games were played on boards made of wood or more valuable materials and used stones, beads, seeds, or carved figures. These were times primarily for abstract games, confronting two opponents in duels of the mind. What they had in common was a simplicity of rules that can be learned in minutes, but allowing for deep strategies and refined tactics that take years to master.  

Go. I discovered it in the 1980s, thanks to the French magazine Jeux & Stratégie. I was fascinated by this ancient oriental game with a minimalist, black-and-white aesthetic. A considerable board, with nineteen by nineteen intersections, starts the game completely empty. Total freedom. The stones are placed alternately, but they no longer move once placed. Pressuring territories, conceding others. Between short-term gains and lasting influences. Action and passivity. Space and time intertwined. With its own language, which sounds exotic to Western ears, long before manga and anime became widespread. Joseki, Ko, Tesuji, Atari!

Mancala. Sow first, to then reap in a circular movement between the spaces on our side of the board and our opponent's. Picking up seeds on our side and distributing them, one by one, to the following spaces, often stopping on the opposite side and even going around the board more than once. It appeals to the senses, between handling the seeds and their characteristic sound hitting the wooden concavities or other seeds. It's a game of complex calculations, especially for those used to more linear thinking, but it's exciting nonetheless. And a concept that you may find in many recent board games.

Chess. It's undoubtedly the game I've played most often, undoubtedly because I've practiced it competitively for many years! I'll leave you with a free translation of the words of Joel Lautier, Grand Master of the sport, in the Larousse du Jeux d'Échecs: ‘What does the game of chess mean to those who play it assiduously? (...) For my part, I would answer the curious but hasty questioner that, for the competitive player that I am, it is a game in substance but a sport in form. If he has more time, I'll tell him about the rigor of the preparation before the game, the intense concentration needed to accurately calculate the variants, the deep aesthetic joy of a combination that reveals itself, the absolute self-control required at the critical moment when the fate of the game swings, and the patience needed to break down the opponent's last defenses one by one. If he becomes my confidant, I'll also tell him about the anguish of the fight, about those terrible defeats that are like so many little deaths in the precise moment.’