Released on = February 10, 2007, 6:40 pm

Press Release Author = Sadako Shikami

Industry = Entertainment

Press Release Summary = Second Life is a massive multi-player system that houses
tens of thousands of users at any one time in a fully-interactive, 3D environment. A
financially-thriving virtual model \"super-sizes\" herself for the sake of art.

Press Release Body = FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Second Life Model \"Super-Sizes\" Herself for Arts Symposium

NMC Campus, Second Life, February 8, 2007 - Sadako Shikami, Second Life model,
escort and artist, will join hundreds of artists, educators, designers and
researchers in a visual symposium for Second Life known as NMConnect. Groupings of
2D, 3D, video and interactive elements will be combined to tell stories on six major
themes: Love, Peace, Beauty, Truth, Chaos, Wisdom.

Sadako chose Beauty as her theme. \"My goal is to challenge the notions of what is
beautiful within the realm of Second Life. Even though we live and work in a world
where we can wear any form possible in the imagination, why is it we seem to
gravitate immediately towards conventional representations of beauty?\" Taking on
this question, Sadako will present a series of life-size photographs, asking viewers
to choose between her normal size 6/8 avatar, and an avatar of herself as a
plus-size woman (about a size 18/20) and to explain their choices. She will then
publish the results to her weblog at http://www.sadakoshikami.com/blog during the
three-day event, from February 11 to 13, 2007.

Participants will be asked to fill out a notecard with questions about their
perceptions, then to vote anonymously on the images they prefer. Both on and offline
a muscular size 8, Sadako is actually considered by most in Second Life to be
wearing a \"heavy\" avatar, with the majority of female body shapes sold in-world
ranging from sizes 2 to 6. \"I\'m hoping the anonymity of the voting process will
allow greater freedom of expression among the participants,\" says Sadako. \"Perhaps
more people will come forward to say they prefer the rounded, realistic shape of the
average-size woman.\"

In addition, Sadako will also be living and working in-world as her plus-size
counterpart during the three-day event. \"I\'m going to continue doing photo shoots as
a model and working as an escort,\" she says. She will be publishing to her blog the
results of the NMConnect Symposium voting as well as live photos and personal
stories of her experience as a plus-sized woman in-world. \"It\'s going to be
interesting, explaining my sudden weight gain to my friends and co-workers. Will I
lose or gain clients, as an escort? I hope to gather as many opinions as possible,
constantly challenging people\'s notions of what is and isn\'t beautiful.\"

A work-at-home mom and budding Second Life object creator, Sadako Shikami first
stretched the limits of her performance art by creating a website to sell
subscriptions to viewers of her avatar\'s adult activities. \"It\'s going great! Far
beyond my expectations, and I\'ve had suprising in-world benefits from bridging from
SL to HTML. \"I think people really enjoy personal interaction with an in-world
avatar combined with a familiar venue such as the Web,\" claims Sadako. \"I hope to
participate in many more in-world arts exhibits and stretch my boundaries further,
but I\'ll always keep bridging them back to the Web so people can relate to my work
in a comfortable, familiar way.\"

For more information and directions to the Symposium, please see the NMConnect page
at http://www.nmc.org/campus/NMConnect, and Sadako Shikami\'s blog at
http://www.sadakoshikami.com/blog/

Web Site = http://www.sadakoshikami.com

Contact Details = touchme@sadakoshikami.com
sadako_shikami@yahoo.com