LUMEN PRIZE: SHORTLISTED ARTISTS 2023

23 SEPTEMBER — 21 OCTOBER 2023

OPENING RECEPTION

FRIDAY, 22 SEPTEMBER, 6–8PM

KYLE MCDONALD
Amends
2023
Website, NFTs (rendered with Houdini) representing three glass sculptures: refrigerant canisters, soil, and olivine
(Part 1) Unique + 1 AP
(Part 2) Unique + 1 AP
(Part 3) Unique + 1 AP
(KMcd001.23)
Price upon request

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

Rooted in the practice of expanded cinema, my work uses creative AI and immersive video to reveal how our media-saturated world shapes and stretches our most intimate desires and questions whether these new technologies are doomed to fossilize existing hegemonies or can otherwise be used to imagine authentic, queer futures.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

Originally from New York City, I now live and work in London after completing a master’s degree (2022) in Creative Computing in the city at the University of the Arts London. Prior to that, I attained Education History BSc Digital Media Design at University of Pennsylvania in 2016.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

The history of art is in many ways the history of new technologies. I’m excited about the digital space because I firmly believe artists must use the most prevalent tools of our environment to critically reflect on the way those tools shape, limit, and potentially expand our collective consciousness.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I work primarily with game engines, speculative fiction, and interactive media in order to uncover interconnections among architecture, ecology, magic, and non-human and machine intelligence.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in 1993 in London, and now I live and work in Los Angeles. I studied an MA in Contemporary Art Practice at The Royal College of Art (Distinction), BAs in Anthropology and Studio Art (Honors) from The University of Chicago.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

In 2020. I love making digital work because of its proximity but also distance from the world we inhabit, and its capacity to speculate and offer generative visions for alternative or future worlds to come.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I attempt to reinterpret classic scenes from Buddhist narratives using digital techniques and futuristic thinking, aiming to retain the relevance of this ancient story within the contemporary context.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Shanghai in China, and now I live and work in Oslo, Norway. I have a BFA in Architecture from Shanghai University.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started self-learning software and creating digital works in 2016. What excites me the most about my personal work and short films is how the virtual and the real interact with each other.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I combine design research with fiction and world-building, to tell stories that reflect on social issues and emerging technologies.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Manila, Philippines, but I now live and work in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. I did a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design in the Philippines (DLS-CSB, 2017) and my master’s degree in Social Design in Design Academy Eindhoven (2020).

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started in 2019, when I first had the idea of creating spaces for therapy on online games like Minecraft. What I love about working in the digital realm is its element of magic and the sense that anything is possible.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I’m really interested in how space is constructed behind the screen, the line that separates 2D from 3D, and how the shape or feeling of a digital space can change through the emergent behavior of the objects that occupy it.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I’m from New England, and I currently work between Rhode Island and upstate New York, where I’m part of a PhD program in Critical Game Design at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. I also hold an MFA from Rhode Island School of Design in Digital + Media and a BS from New York University in Integrated Digital Media.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I’ve made digital work my whole life, but I started working in game software around two years ago. Game software is particularly interesting to me because the work constructs itself in real time. What you see, you may have never seen before and you may never see again. It’s non-deterministic.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My work centers around machine-learning based art that investigates our human relation to technology and data.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Denmark, and have an MA in Fine Art from University of the Arts London (2016), and am currently undertaking an MPhil/PHD in Fine Art from the Royal College of Art in London.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I have been working with machine learning in my artistic practice since 2016. I find it very fascinating to use the medium of machine-learning to investigate questions around the existential and ethical dilemmas which AI poses about our human lives.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

Both coming from the universe of creative programming, Iván Abreu and I channel different creative explorations that range from architecture and sound art to the intersections between science and art. Together we generate a conversation full of digital poetics that is experienced through ever-changing live cinema coding and immersive experiences. Our work is an intense display of live cinema coding of musical aesthetics which are a hybrid of introspective landscapes, glitch noise and intricate rhythms (written live by CNDSD) alongside visuals of 3D spaces intervened by procedural animation, real-time video synthesis, CGI and expressive light control (collaboratively programmed by CNDSD and Abreu).

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

Both of us, Malitzin Cortes and Ivan Abreu Cuban, are Mexican and work in Mexico City. Iván studied Informational Design in Cuba and I studied architecture and algorithmic music. We both specialize in creative coding, and are science lovers and technologists. We started from sound experimentation, and over time used different software to expand our practices and initiate new research around data visualization, avant-garde electronic music, machine learning and live coding.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Digital matter is unlimited and goes through different states of material, as well as being capable of being displaying itself in different formats, interfaces and information surfaces. We love expanding our various technological and poetic skills in search of emotions beyond the screens.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

Currently, my work, writing and research is preoccupied with such synthetic epistemologies, ecologies of automation, computational aesthetics and models of networked sovereignty.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in St. Petersburg and have lived nomadically for the past 25 years, most recently basing myself in Vienna and Tokyo. I graduated from Rodchenko School [RU], Academy of Arts Vienna [AT], Central St. Martins College [UK], Tokyo Geidai University [JP] & Strelka Institute, where I’ve studied media, speculative design, film, philosophy and art. I hold an MFA and multiple postgraduate degrees and I also teach at the University of Art & Design in Linz.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

In my work, I’ve always been concerned with the domain ontologies of human and non-human agencies and epistemic technologies, and the way in which they not only amplify the knowledge-making capacities of humans but produce their own knowledge-making agents, models and scales. The outcome of what I do is often expressed in a form of speculative models, thought–object experiments and dynamic, community-operated networks. This involves practical experiments with artificial information systems, computational technologies, films, interventions, texts & various material productions. I tend to create speculative narratives that highlight frictions between human reasoning and quantitative orders preferred by machines, industrialisation and anthropogenic interventions at large.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I’m excited about building creative systems that explore our cultures through automation and technology, often re-imaging or re-examining ‘the traditional’ in new and dynamic ways.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I’ve lived a nomad’s life around the globe – moving between Switzerland, India, Bangladesh, Egypt, the Philippines, Mexico, and the US. Though I’m originally South Asian, I’ve made NYC home for the last 12 years. Before that, I studied Computer Science at Cornell University.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

After keeping software and art on separate tracks for most of my life, my interests finally clicked into place in 2021 when I began pursuing larger, more ambitious generative art projects. I love working in this medium because of the countless dimensions it offers: scale, automation, interactivity, portability, and dynamism.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

Through the project’s projection of modernity, we ask: how can we draw examples from history which illuminate the invention of modernities from within Africa, rather than received from elsewhere?

Biography

Russel Hlongwane (ZA) works between art-making (installation and film) and curating. His performance work operates as a bridge to transmit his academic interest to a broader audience, while his writing practice moves between academia, policy and art journals. He works intentionally with language (isiZulu) as a way to mobilize ideas contained in suppressed histories. The Lo-Def Film Factory was created by Francois Knoetze (ZA)and Amy Louise Wilson (ZA). Their work involves archival research, dramaturgy, and visual strategies associated with video art, collage, sculptural installation, and new media, to create space for experimental community storytelling. They are particularly focused on engaging with young people to make participatory research-creation projects.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I weave electronic devices into soft materials and the fabric of everyday life for various applications ranging from physiological sensing, human-computer interaction, space exploration, to the interactive arts.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Birmingham, United Kingdom. I am an Indonesian citizen based in Boston, USA, with a Media Arts and Sciences PhD from the MIT Media Lab, USA, an MSc in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology from ETH Zurich, Switzerland, and a BEng in Electronic Engineering from University of Southampton, UK.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

In 2019. I aspire to augment knitted textiles with sensory and computation capabilities that bridge and merge the physical and digital worlds to evoke magical and novel experiences.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I like to explore the rapid overtake of technology. I’m interested in what we define as the basis of knowledge and how it relates to cultural and social inheritance – religion, the occult, archetypes, ritualistic practices – the intemporal nature and never-changing nature of things alongside changes of mediums and tools. Everybody is still seeking answers or some sort of enlightenment, either through a Moses, ayahuasca or an Iphone 14 Pro Max.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Portugal and studied Piano and Music Composition at the Gulbenkian Conservatory in Braga. I finished my Bachelor’s degree in Music Composition in 2019 at the Escola Superior de Música de Lisboa and I’m currently doing a Master’s in Multimedia Composition at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Since early on, I’ve been interested in incorporating technology into my work. I guess it’s just a natural response to my surroundings. In the same way Berlioz used the trombone, I get captivated by working in digital spaces.

Biography:

Jonas Lund is interested in the power dynamics framing the increasing digitalisation of contemporary culture. Working across painting, sculpture, photography, digital environments and performance, he builds systems that examine conditions of labor, agency, and authorship within automated collaborative processes. Lund engages with emergent AI models as a co-creator within his narrative worlds, provocatively blurring the line between human and machinic intelligence. Within his multilayered projects, the artist speculates on how this entwined relationship might play out within both the art market and broader social-financial systems.

Born in Linköping, Sweden, and currently based between Amsterdam and Berlin, Jonas Lund (b. 1984) earned his MA at Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam (2013) and his BFA at Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam (2009).

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

Plastic art, lighting, sound and performance are mixed into my practice. I try to find a continuum aesthetic that varies in different spaces.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Shanghai, where I now also live and work. I studied sculpture in Shanghai, and then Art Plastique at the National Higher School of Fine Art in Nice (Villa Arson), Electroacoustic Music in Conservatory in Nice and finally Creation/Study in Le Fresnoy-National Studio of Contemporary of Arts.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

From 2013, I started creating digital works, especially from sound creation. Digital spaces contain unlimited possibilities; they can create works from physical data, analog data and digital algorithm.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My work focuses on the uncanny and awkward boundary between live performance and the digital.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I live and work in New York.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

The digital space excites me because it is a stage on which we enact a heightened version of IRL selves

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I make work that transcends our notions of reality, and its inherent or adopted possibilities and limitations. It presents a heightened reality, which extends beyond the experienced and observed world, and examines the human position and existence, through virtue of everything we touch and what surrounds and shapes us.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Denmark, where I grew up in the countryside in the south. Now I live in Oslo in Norway, where I studied at the art academy and obtained a BFA in 2017 and an MFA in 2019. I work between Denmark and Norway.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I briefly tried working digital back in 2016, while I was studying. This video is my first real digital work, which I begun working on in 2021. The techniques of 3D-animation enable us to create imagery that normally cannot be experienced in real life, but only through thought and imagination.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I want to bring deep research and clever interventions to the code-driven computational worlds that seem to be increasingly out of control.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I live in Los Angeles and was raised in southern California. I have a Master’s in Fine Art and a Bachelor’s of Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

My first exhibited work is a generative piece from 2004 called “Empathy”. Back then, I was most excited by the way that digital work could unfold infinitely. Then I found purpose in online community and the open source scene. Recently, I’ve been excited by work that goes beyond the online and computational to connect with a broader ecosystem.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My work explores how archival material can come to be reinterpreted in the digital age — what new meanings can arise from digitally processing archival images, and how can these meanings change how we see and interact with archival material?

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Cali, Colombia, and I’m currently based in London, UK. I have a Bachelor of Media Studies from the University of British Columbia (2017-2021) and a Master of Science in Media and Communications, from the London School of Economics (2022-2023).

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started creating digital art at 13 years old, when I began to teach myself Photoshop on my father’s computer. I am excited to be working in the digital space because of the feeling of possibility that surrounds this practice — you never know what technology or innovation is coming next!

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I am a London based media artist. Most of my work uses 3D animation, game design software, and 3D scanning technologies to capture and visualise architectures and landscapes that relate to British identity and history. My output ranges across digital and the analogue: short films, installations, prints and virtual environments.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in London in 1985 and still live in the city. I did not come to artistic production through the traditional art school route. I read English at University College London as a BA student, then worked in advertising for four years, while also completing an MA in Photojournalism and Documentary Photography from the London College of Communication.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Around 2012 I became interested in how photography was becoming raw material for use in elaborate photorealistic 3D visualisations, for example those created by architects to visualise future buildings and public spaces. I’m excited by in the immediacy and the scale of distribution that can be achieved through digital media and the opportunities for artists to teach themselves how to use these technologies very quickly.

Link to the artwork: https://readitandweep.live/

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I focus on our relationship to the internet and the way we understand our identity through the process of consuming and producing content online.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Philadelphia, PA, USA. I currently live and work in Los Angeles, California. I hold a Bachelor of Arts degrees in Computer Science and Media Studies from Pomona College and an MFA in Media Art from UCLA.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Ever since I was a little girl I knew that I wanted to be on the computer a lot.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My current practice is research-based, in which I study deeply personal topics relating to my identity, memory, and ancestry using cultural methods and various AI technologies. The methods I employ when questioning and gathering information inform the output and message that I want to craft in my artwork.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, then I moved to a boarding school in the US at age 13, and I’ve subsequently lived between these two countries ever since. Today, I am based in NYC. I studied computational architecture and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) at Carnegie Mellon University and later got a Master’s in New Media Art at NYU’s ITP Graduate program.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started creating digital works around 2014 while studying computational architecture, which combines coding, architectural design, and sometimes robotics arms! I enjoyed working in an interdisciplinary way and using code as a medium to express ideas. It was fulfilling to working in this playful and free-thinking mode when using technology.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My work explores the ability of video games to mediate reading and affect, by guiding the player with cinematic interactivity and connecting the act of “wandering” in video games with an individual’s feelings in wartime.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in 1995 in Ningde City, in the Fujian Province of China. I currently live in Hangzhou City, in Zhejiang Province of China. I have an MFA from The Centre for Chinese Visual Studies at the China Academy of Art and a BA from the Open Media Department, School of Intermedia Art, China Academy of Art.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started creating digital art in 2016, and what excites me most about digital art is that I get to discuss the issues of this era in a medium that belongs to it.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I am a Dutch artist and researcher of resolutions with a special focus on glitches, resolutions, cyclopes, impossible rainbows, unnamed colours and IANA, the goddess of staircases.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

Arnhem, Netherlands. I studied new media at the University of Amsterdam.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

My interest started with the course Artificial Intelligence and Algorithmic Arts in 2003.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I reimagine video games as a medium for live performance and video art, and explore the blurred boundaries between real and virtual worlds.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I live and work in London. I studied Classics as an undergraduate at Oxford, trained as an actor at LAMDA and am currently a PhD candidate at the School of Arts and Creative Technologies at the University of York.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started making machinima in 2021. I find it very exciting to merge the seemingly disparate cultural spheres of classical theatre and video games, and to challenge their perceived positions in a supposed hierarchy of artistic expression.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

My work explores digital culture, with a particular focus on human-machine interactions and the influence of emerging technologies on our behaviour and experiences.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Gloucestershire, UK, and currently live and work in Birmingham. I graduated in 2017 with a degree in Interactive Arts from Manchester School of Art. Recently, I completed a master’s program in Computational Art at Goldsmiths, University of London.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

I started creating digital works in 2019 during a residency with Creative Youth Network in Bristol. The aspect that excites me the most is the ability to merge the digital and physical, allowing us to manifest intangible systems in a way which fosters curiosity, facilitates discussion and provokes critical thinking.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

We how technology can catalyse interpersonal relationships and enable alternative human experiences. By creating participatory systems, we urge the audience to question who controls our online presence and speculate on how we might interact in the future.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

Max Čelar, born in Ljubjana, Slovenia (1994), based in London, BArch Architectural Association School of Architecture London. Jakob Skote, born in Ystad, Sweden (1990), based in Malmö, BArch Architectural Association School of Architecture, London. Michael Brewster, born in Uxbridge, UK (1995), based in London, MArch Bartlett UCL.

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Our interest in digital technologies started during our architecture studies. We explored how AI and immersive technologies will affect the design of homes and urban spaces. The digital realm offers many opportunities for fresh perspectives, imagining the future, and exploring new types of social interactions.

Biography:

theVERSEverse is a digital poetry gallery where text is art, poetry is technology, and language is limitless.

Can you define your practice briefly: what do you try to explore through your work?

I primarily work with sound, voice, text, and moving images to explore the cultural and philosophical implications of folklore, oral history, vernacular knowledge production, and myth in order to contemplate our contemporary world.

Where were you born, what did you study and where do you now live and work?

I was born in Seoul, South Korea and I’m based in Copenhagen, Denmark. I have a BA in Fine Arts from Goldsmiths College in London (2013), and a MA in Fine Art from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen (2021).

When did you start creating digital work and what excites you most about working in the digital space?

Within the process of interpreting, translating, and adopting, I am fascinated by how the digital form of materials become reinterpreted, recontextualised, and reconfigured. I try to raise a new level of reality or creating a surreal fabrication out of what is real and present, re-imagining it to create ‘sonic fiction’.