To play in virtual worlds: stories, metaverse ecologies and dress-up games

This paper will bring together three terms originating from disciplines that at first glance may seem to be unrelated to artistic activity in Virtual Environments or Virtual Worlds: ‘Storyworld’ which is grounded in the field of Narratology, Gesamtkunstwerk’ from the field of Aesthetics and the concept of 'Play' as described by Johan Huizinga. These three terms will be used as the theoretical framework that explicates on the creation of virtual, three dimensional ‘art ecologies’ for narrative purposes in virtual worlds, as well as the nature of dress-up games that the avatars who populate these ecologies engage in. One such art ecology and a virtual fashion enterprise created by the author, will be used as examples as to how such narrative activities are built and populated.