Transformations Exhibition

Art in Flux: Transformations
20th December - 20th March 2023

Curated by Maria Almena & Olive Gingrich
Exhibition Design: Christopher MacInnes

As London’s foremost forum for pioneering media arts, Art in Flux is excited to present our latest virtual exhibition Art in Flux: Transformations supported by Arts Council England and The National Gallery.

During the pandemic media artists provided a silver lining of cultural activity. Post-Covid, the role of technology in society has changed the way we work, communicate, consume and create culture globally. This technological transformation necessitates a reflection on the artists’ role in forging this societal change. How can artists help to ensure that digital resources remain accessible, affordable, ethical, and human-centred? As active agents, visionaries and pioneers of rapidly changing techno-cultures, media artists lead by example through their own practice, frequently identifying public deficits through their art. Through talks, performances and a hybrid exhibition, ‘Art in Flux: Transformations’ spotlights intersections between arts and society.

Over the last 3 years, Art in Flux in collaboration with National Gallery X, led a public discourse on artistic strategies to address societal needs including the need for equal representation, environmental change and wellbeing. By asking important questions around agency, accessibility and the role technology and creativity play, this discourse now culminates in the ‘Transformations’ event at National Gallery X. In this event we come together to reflect on tectonic shifts in society, and how media artists encounter, engender and question such societal ‘Transformations’.

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Artwork & Artist Details

THE ANALEMA GROUP

APHRA SHEMZA & STUART BATCHELOR

Press enquiries please contact: info@artinfluxlondon.com

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Through their capabilities to activate and offer new types of creativities, media artists have long thought to actively address societal issues including gender, public health and the environment. During the Renaissance, artists now exhibited at the National Gallery used radical new approaches in painting such as central perspective. Nowadays, artists challenge points of view through new technological strategies such as AI (Jake Elwes), 360 video (Natasha Trotman), or real-time AR performance (Kimatica) to disrupt the way we see ourselves in relationship to our contexts (Umwelt), to interrogate our presence and understand our own agency in the process of building and creating the society we form part of.
This exhibition presents seven areas of societal change that contemporary media artists address through their artistic positions. Whether questions of cultural heritage (Aphra Shemza), our relationship with data (Analema Group) or our wellbeing (Kira Zhigalina), Transformations offers a space for discussion on the possibilities of how the media artists address the need for societal shifts towards a more inclusive and human-centred society. Taking the National Gallery as a historic starting point, Art in Flux will present artistic strategies within this context, as a culmination of a three year residency.

The exhibition features work by Analema Group, Aphra Shemza, Jake Elwes, Kimatica Studio, Kira Zhigalina, Magik Door, Natasha Trotman, Stuart Batchelor. Designed by Christopher MacInnes, ‘Transformations’ will be launched on the 20th of December.

The exhibition is held in a bespoke virtual exhibition environment created by Christopher MacInnes. The gallery space has been inspired by the architecture of a number of key institutions such as the roof of the British Museum. The virtual space has been placed in the centre of Trafalgar square as a way to reclaim this central space within the City of London, for the underrepresented in society and highlight our importance in the building of a new world post Covid.

Artwork & Artist Details

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