Transient Reality: Blurring Boundaries Between Humanity, Technology, and Art
Photo Courtesy: Record of Exhibition, BluBlu, 2024

Transient Reality: Blurring Boundaries Between Humanity, Technology, and Art

Transient Reality is a group exhibition, featuring emerging artists working in digital painting, film, VR work, photography sculpture, etc. The exhibition was curated by Yijiao (Heather) Dong and had the judging team of Keyi Liu and Ruiyan Sun.

Technology is constantly permeating our daily lives, blurring the line between reality and the virtual.

Technology is constantly recording our lives, allowing fleeting moments of reality to exist in another dimension of time.

The group exhibition, Transient Reality, explores the theme of the transience and instability brought about by technology, and investigates the boundaries of interaction between reality and virtuality, humanity and technology, reminding people to reflect on how technology reshapes their perception, cognition, and experience. The exhibition showcases digital artworks created by emerging artists, each conveying their contemporary narratives through distinctive artistic approaches and technical methodologies. Artists use digital technology to blur the temporal dimension, creating new, ambiguous realities where viewers can gaze at moments and glimpse eternity.

The exhibition confronts the rapid changes in our world and the dilemmas of human existence. In an era where reality and virtuality, nature and artificiality are increasingly intertwined, humanity faces the critical question of whether it will forge a more promising future or find itself at an impasse. This is the issue that the exhibition seeks to provoke thoughtful reflection on.

Transient Reality: Blurring Boundaries Between Humanity, Technology, and Art

Photo Courtesy: Record of Exhibition, BluBlu, 2024

Curator, Yijiao Dong

Yijiao (Heather) Dong is a London-based emerging curator specializing in contemporary art that explores themes of womanhood, migration, and collective memory. Her curatorial practice centers on the intersection of visual storytelling and healing, fostering critical dialogue through innovative programming initiatives and challenging traditional narratives.

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Film and Television from Hong Kong Baptist University and a Master’s degree in Film Studies and Philosophy from King’s College London, she has provided professional support for important cultural institutions and galleries such as Somerset House, the Serpentine Gallery, the Southbank Centre, and the Hayward Gallery. Her passion lies in engaging in collaborative curatorial projects, thereby providing a vital platform for marginalized artists and creators to showcase their work.

Ziyi Wang & Chenshuo Xu, The Ultimate Samsara

Ziyi Wang is an art director, composer, and sound artist working between moving images and experimental music. In 2022, she completed her Master of Arts degree in Fashion, Film, and Digital Production at the London College of Fashion. By studying religious customs and folk traditions in various cultures, she aims to use mysticism to promote social equality, diversity, and inclusiveness (EDI).

Chenshuo Xu is a director and digital artist who completed a Master of Arts degree in Fashion Film and Digital Production at the University of the Arts London in 2022. He is dedicated to looking at ancient folk legends from a modern perspective and creating contemporary myths using various media to spark reflection on humanity’s present and future.

Two artists collaborated to produce a fashion film “Ultimate Samsara,” which explores the authenticity of digital identity in ancient Chinese rituals and portrays digital fantasia between folktale, metaverse, and reincarnation. This is an exploration that fuses Chinese culture, fashion, and identity, showcasing the cultural connection between tradition and the contemporary through 3D space. With the help of digital technology, the ancient Nuo dance has been reborn in the metaverse.

Yilun Li, Ethereal Convergence

“Ethereal Convergence” is a series of wearable art installations that explores the fleeting moments where digital technology and physical reality meet. Through the interplay of mirrored surfaces, translucent structures, and dynamic textures, the work captures the delicate and ever-changing state between the virtual and the real.

The reflective materials evoke the shifting light and shadows of the digital world, while layers of transparency suggest the blurred lines between virtual spaces. Movable and suspended elements introduce a sense of motion, embodying the beauty of impermanence and transformation. Together, these elements weave a multidimensional narrative that feels like a journey through signals and sensations, bridging the tangible and intangible.

“Ethereal Convergence” invites viewers to reflect on how technology reshapes our realities and identities, offering a poetic meditation on the transient nature of the future we are creating.

Lin Li (Ruki)  Organic Phantom

Lin Li (Ruki) is a London-based illustrator whose work explores themes of color, healing, and imagination, who graduated from the London College of Fashion. Her works are centered around themes of color, healing, and imagination, filled with fantastical characters and dreamlike landscapes, creating a place for contemporary people to escape from reality.

She integrates her multidisciplinary background into her artistic creations, using digital technology to create hybrid figures of humans and insects in this series of works, Organic Phantom, exploring a new visual language that is more interactive, diverse, and open. The combination of elements blurs the boundary between the virtual and the real, carrying a strong symbolic meaning. The bee symbolizes wisdom and diligence, while the third eye represents insight and exploration of the unknown. The spider symbolizes creativity and patience, and the silk it spins metaphorically represents the absorption and feedback of information from the external environment.

Transient Reality: Blurring Boundaries Between Humanity, Technology, and Art

Photo Courtesy: Record of Exhibition, BluBlu, 2024

Susie Luo, Digital Panopticon Prison

Susie Luo’s digital VR work, “Digital Panoramic Prison,” reveals in a highly visual way the invisible and ubiquitous surveillance that exists in contemporary society. The work draws inspiration from Michel Foucault’s theories on power and surveillance, particularly his profound analysis of Jeremy Bentham’s “Panopticon” model.

Visually, the work uses VR technology to create an immersive experience, making the audience both “viewers” and “being viewed”. The sound design serves as “the whispers of data”, extending the environment and symbolizing hidden forces. Through digital VR technology, the concept of an “invisible prison” becomes visible, audible, and tangible. The audience also becomes part of this “digital panoptic prison” system, they are not just spectators, but also participants – dreamers unwittingly enmeshed in a system that sees them, even when they cannot see it.

Cecheng Shan, Ice Fish

Judo Shan’s series of ecological-themed works, including the interactive installation work ‘Ice Fish’ and multiple sculptures made of mixed materials. Its highly life-like and experimental installations create unique scenarios that bring a visceral sense of urgency to climate change and environmental pollution, inspiring audiences to reflect deeply on the relationship between humans and nature. Through the metaphors in the works, the artist discloses the multiple identities of human beings in the face of nature, that is, participants, destroyers, protectors, and symbionts. The work was first shown to the public during the SVA bio-art residency’s open day, and the entire exhibition process was a time-based performance art presentation.

David Wang, No Title

David Wang, a New York-based artist, explores the intersections of digital innovation and self-reflection, focusing on procedural language and evolving communication media.

No Title, part of Wang’s project 2023 Investigating the Digital Reality, examines the tension between the digital and organic. Inspired by camera malfunctions, the work transforms technological errors into alternate realities, revealing unexpected beauty in imperfection. These glitches challenge the pursuit of flawlessness, reflecting the fragmented nature of existence in a tech-mediated world.

Kylie Li, To Be With Me

The photography work “To Be with Me” by artist Kylie Li uses a strong contrast between black and white to deeply explore the emotional resonance in intimate relationships. This work is based on a profound reflection on how to establish security through others and creates two characters – “Seeker” and “Giver” – to freeze the emotional state of their encounter.

In this work, black symbolizes the profound fragility and emptiness within individuals, evoking feelings of unease and disorientation. Conversely, white represents a steadfast presence akin to a loyal companion, serving as a guiding beacon. The stark contrast between these colors not only highlights the source of emotional security but also illuminates the intricate and profound connections between individuals.

Transient Reality: Blurring Boundaries Between Humanity, Technology, and Art

Photo Courtesy: Record of Exhibition, BluBlu, 2024

Whiskey Wu, In My Brain

The video interactive installation work “In My Brain, When My Eyes See You” by artist Whiskey Wu attempts to interpret the concept of “love” through sensory interaction. This installation consists of two main components: a video display and a video sensor. A video of the artist’s own eyes is continuously looped on the screen. When an audience member approaches and gazes at the video, the installation is activated, triggering a sensor to play a randomly generated melody. The artist hopes to convey that when people gaze into the eyes of someone they love, their thoughts are carried away as if they are composing a unique melody that exists only for that person.

OHUO, Working Women

OHuo is a collaborative art practice founded in 2023 by Fan Yu and Song Lu, multimedia artists from Guizhou, China, who met at the School of Visual Arts in New York. The name “OHuo!”—a Guizhou exclamation of surprise—captures the spark of discovery in their work. Through AI-generated imagery and animation, they evoke moments of wonder and introspection. Their work has been exhibited in New York and Shanghai.

Working Women is a series by OHuo that reimagines iconic female figures from mythology, history, science, fiction, and pop culture using AI. Fragmented identities emerge in AI-generated landscapes, prompting new explorations of women’s representations.

Published by Tom W.

(Ambassador)

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