SPEAKERS: ALI HOSSAINI | LUCIANA HAILL (Talk and Demo) | MENDEL KAELEN (Talk and Demo)​​ | KIMATICA STUDIO (Talk) | NATASHA TROTMAN (talk) | RACHAEL WINGFIELD (talk)
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How are contemporary artists and scientists using technology to create transformative experiences for the future of humanity’s well being?

Humans have always pursued transformative experiences consistently throughout our known history. However, only recently, there has been a resurgence, mainly through research in psychotherapy and neuroscience, attempting to better understand the processes behind these experiences. How to create them? What is their effect? And could they have a positive impact? Advances in science can now measure the intensity of the meditative and transformative experiences art can create, opening new opportunities for the future of well-being.

In this evening of immersive existential inquiry, “Levitations” will explore how media artists, scientists and researchers are creating experiences for therapeutic purposes with the intention of transforming our society. Can media art experiences have a positive impact on our body, mind and our society as a whole? Can these artistic experiences help us to “levitate” into a better future?

Relating contemporary art works to some of the artists from The National Gallery’s Collection who use light as a transformative medium such as Van Gogh, Cézanne and Turner, “Levitations” will expand on the role that immersive technologies should have in our contemporary society in order to address the deepest of individual and societal needs. Contributing to design a framework for methodologies when creating these types of experiences, Levitations will provide a space for discourse and new collaborations.

Book your free tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/levitations-tickets-118204682387

​About the Curator
Maria Almena: Curator and Co-Founder Art in Flux & Creative Director Kimatica Studio
@kimaticastudio @maria_kimatica http://kimatica.net

Maria Almena is a Spanish London-based creative director, art curator and a multimedia artist. Co-founder of the creative studio, Kimatica www.kimatica.net, as well as co-founder of the charitable organisation Art in Flux http://www.artinfluxlondon.com/.
 
Maria's practice is exploring concepts of human consciousness and perception, making those transcendental ideas accessible to a modern audience, to inspire reconnection with magical thinking and the ethereal world. Fascinated by the juxtaposition of the physical and spiritual, the virtual and real spaces, and the scientific and artistic concepts. She enjoys playing with perception aiming to transport the viewer into new worlds, using experimental technologies as magical tools that help to dramatise the transition between different states of being and highlighting the importance of the journey in itself. 
 
With Kimatica she has been commissioned by British council, Tate Museum, Instagram, Barbican centre, Veuve Clicquot and many Light and Art festivals like Lightwaves, Wilderness and Jerusalem festivals. With Flux she has participated in projects supported by Arts Council England and Computers Arts Society, as well as exhibiting at V&A Museum, Royal College of Art amongst many others.

​About the Host
Ali Hossaini: Co-Director of National Gallery X
http://pantar.com/

Ali Hossaini works at the cutting edge of art, technology and science. His artwork Ouroboros was acclaimed by the New York Times, which calls him “a biochemist turned philosopher turned television producer turned visual poet.” He collaborates with a wide range of talent, and his video installations and performances have been presented worldwide. He is a senior research fellow in the Department of Engineering at King's College London and co-director of National Gallery X.

​About the Speakers:

Luciana Haill: Fine Artist, lecturer and consciousness researcher
www.lucianahaill.co.uk

Luciana Haill creates artworks that explore altered states of consciousness, and focus on sleep, lucid dreaming, memory and nostalgia. Having completed the first-ever degree in interactive art in the UK, led by Roy Ascott in Newport in 1995, she pioneered the use of brainwave monitoring and creates artworks which combine digital media, augmented reality, performance, drawing and binaural soundscapes. 

Inspired by the surrealists and the Beat Generation she creates performances where she controls her own brainwave patterns using 'Dreamachines' and electronic choreogepahed strobe lights in order to trigger dream-like soundscapes and visuals in real-time. Such performances have taken place at venues including Waag Society (Netherlands),  Kibla (Slovenia), FACT (UK) and SPILL Festival (UK). She has also exhibited installations using found objects and digital projections at venues including Phoenix Art Space (UK) and Watermans London (UK). She worked for several year with musician Arthur Brown to create a new brain and movement performance that took place at Bestival, Isle of Man in 2016.

Recently inspired by how Silicon Valley entrepreneurs used meditation and psychedelics  to unlock their creativity and some of her own client’s meditation experiences during her research,, she created 'Ecstasis' combining several powerful techniques. Ecstasis is an expansive experience that guides you how to achieve more Theta brainwaves. Commonly also termed 'flow' through self-transcendence in a safe, digitally mediated experience similar to Virtual Reality using her own equipment and neurofeedback.

She is a visiting lecturer for the MA Digital Media Arts course in Brighton University.

Mendel Kaelen: Neuroscientist
https://wavepaths.com/

Mendel Kaelen is the founder and CEO of Wavepaths. Prior to this, he worked as a PhD and postdoctoral neuroscientist at Imperial College London for 7 years, where his research was the first to demonstrate music’s central role in psychedelic therapies. He developed methods and protocols for the use of music to enhance therapy outcomes and out of this, the vision for Wavepaths. He is a thought leader on the therapeutic use of music and publishes and speaks frequently on this topic. He has been featured in Nature News, San Francisco Chronicles, Vice Motherboard, Rolling Stone and TEDx. Mendel’s work is driven heavily by his personal work with psychedelic medicines and psychotherapies that started 15 years ago. He lives and works in London (UK), and in his spare time likes to get into nature, and to get out of his mind with his Shakuhachi and modular synthesiser. 

Natasha Trotman: Neurodivergent artist
https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/residents/natasha-trotman

Natasha is an Inclusive Designer, Maker and Researcher whose work focuses on mental
difference and neurodiversity as a way to foster new conversations and new approaches to the world around us. Her work examines different ways of experiencing and processing the world – for people with hidden disabilities and neurodivergent communities such as dyspraxic and autistic persons, through to people living with dementia; she also works with neurotypical people. Her work not only seeks to raise awareness concerning mental difference and marginalised experiences but to also reframe mainstream notions of equality, equity, diversity, and inclusion; asking audiences to consider the nuances and complexities of these terms through provocations, play and creative 'interrogations'.

Natasha studied Information Experience Design (IED) at the Royal College of Art and has a
Masters degree in IED, with a background in Graphic Design and Computer Science. She is
also a special educational needs/disability practitioner working with disabled children and young people. She has exhibited widely, creating sensory workshops and exhibits at cultural
institutions and organisations including The Victoria and Albert Museum, The London Design
Biennale at Somerset House, the National Portrait Gallery and Tate Britain and was selected for The Shaw Trust Powerlist Top 100 Influential Disabled People 2019.

Rachael Wingfield: Founder and Creative Director Loop.ph & Soma Lab
https://the-dots.com/users/rachel-wingfield-272329

Rachel Wingfield is Founder and Creative Director of the spatial laboratory Loop.pH & wellness studio Soma Lab in London.

Her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), NY, the V&A Museum, London, Fosters Private Art Collection, Geneva and the Bloomberg Collection, London.

A frontierswoman for a new creative field where designers intervene at an urban scale to create new visions for healthy human habitats. She also develops collaborative tools for public engagement and multidisciplinary practices. Wingfield consults on creative strategies and speculative futures for business and the public sector.

Rachel trained at the Royal College of Art in London and specialised in adaptive, smart materials for the built environment, inspired by the study of biology and living systems. Today Wingfield speculates on near and far future scenarios that explore emerging biological and technological futures by crafting space into visionary experiences and environments.
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Recent clients include The Manchester Science Festival, Burj Al Arab Hotel, Swarovski, Royal Historical Palaces, Bloomberg, Fosters and Partners, Kew Gardens, EDF & Lille3000, Belvedere, BMW & The ICA, Centre of the Cell and the Medical Research Council.