Barbican, London From Cuba to Mexico, from Hong Kong to Iraq, the Belgian artist has made 40 mesmerising films of kids at play, including three with guns up to no good in a war zone
Cries and laughter, clapping and calls and screams of delight fill the gallery. There are children everywhere on the multiple screens that fill the lower floor. Kids in Cuba careen round the streets of Havana on precarious trolleys fashioned from bits of wood and discarded junk. They rattle and slew on cobbles and jink round corners, under the amused and indulgent eyes of adults as they come hurtling past. The game is both exhilarating and frightening to watch, the young pilots and passengers inches away from hideous injury. Talk about health and safety.
Little girls on a London housing estate swipe at each other’s conkers in a game that’s been largely banished from British school playgrounds. Of course, there’s a lot more to the culture of conkers than whacking horse chestnuts on a bit of string. How careful you have to be – preparing the conker, drilling it and threading it on to a string. All games, like art, have their rules and conditions.