As we come to the end of 2020, we can look back at the events that landed us in what felt like a parallel dystopian universe. Most of 2020 was a period of heavy isolation, with as limited of interactions as possible. In doing so, this forced many of us…
Sounds are an increasingly prevalent form of digital art, which Julia Fairbrother strongly demonstrates through one of her most recent works, The Sounds That Divide Us (2020). The national anthems of the ten countries with the most COVID-19 cases are presented, creating a singular anthem that stands alone as its…
In Gazing (2019) Zhongkai Li explores voyeurism and authority. Li confronts the viewer with their own image projected upon a simple black screen; at once, the interpreted becomes interactive. With a user’s enabled webcam, Li plants their face into a revolving video channel with five other strangers. By moving the…
“Each person is temporal, but the ideas that mankind creates are eternal. It perpetuates itself” – A.I. Alex, The Station 1920s. In the grand scheme of time, humans have not existed long at all. Regardless, we have made irreversible changes to the Earth in the age of the Anthropocene. And…
In the first thirty seconds of Andrea Mikysková’s True Match (2017), the viewer is rapidly confronted with imagery of our highly developed, global world. Abrupt alarms and whistling horns signal the beginning of a work day and positions social media—the stated subject of the piece—firmly within the realm of business….
Believe it or not, Amazon actually has a patent for a flying warehouse. It’s called Airborne Fulfillment Center, and its patent details a warehouse that could stand at a high altitude, deploying drones (called “unmanned aerial vehicles”, or UAVs, in the document) to deliver goods to the customers. Futuristic…
As users immersed in this digital world, our data is collected, harvested, used and then concealed from us, despite being the creators. Judith Sönnicken does not just sympathize with us, she challenges this system and places the power back in our hands. Judith and her two interdimensional space travelers are…
“Happy Hump Day😜!” “Almost the weekend…😅” “TGIF!🙌🏽” Some might call this ‘smiling through the pain.’ The term “late capitalism” has recently become a particularly popular phrase used to refer to and criticize our modern economy. I interpret Fidelia Lam’s GIFs as a reaction to the overwhelming emphasis on hyper-productivity that…
I stepped into a frame in which artist Karissa Hahn allows for no escape. Just as how Nam June Paik employed a conceptual use of video in Buddha Watching TV, in which a camera and a monitor loop in real time, Karissa Hahn destructs parallels of frames so that she…
Emily Sasmor’s STRANGERS COWBOYS is a journey that takes place over time, with many different elements, exploring the lives of (unnamed) characters taking place in a seemingly apocalyptic universe. Sasmor’s work is gripping– in a way that the viewer themselves can become lost in the labyrinthine layers of the complex…