We are excited to be collaborating with Videotage, a Hong Kong based new media art organisation as part of the Peer to Peer: UK/HK 2022.
Peer to Peer: UK/HK 2022 is an initiative led by University of Salford and Open Eye Gallery Liverpool and supported by Arts Council England. The project encourages and facilitates visual arts exchange between the UK and Hong Kong. Organisations from each country are paired up and embark on a cultural collaboration aiming to support practitioners and their work.
After meeting up with Videotage we discovered that there were several curatorial threads that interested us both; creating work within or inspired by games and the relationship between virtual worlds and the human body / state. We wanted to run a short, online residency shaped by these themes and we are delighted to announce the artists chosen to take part.
UK / BOM: Ama Dogbe
Ama is a British-Ghanaian digital artist making moving image work ranging from traditional film to experimental and abstract 3D animations. She is using the Residency as a way of exploring ideas of societal pressure and assimilation in diasporic communities. The book ‘Dear Senthuran’ by Akwaeke Emezi is a strong influence and reference point for Ama. In the book, Emezi describes their experience of feeling like they are wearing different masks in different spaces. The book has been described as ‘a memoir that transcends expectation and challenges readers to explore our own flesh and spiritual multiplicities.’ (Ajani, A. 2021).
HK / Videotage: Yarli Allison
Yarli’s work explores themes of digital humanity with CGI imagery, digital sculpting, performances and moving-images. She is interested in how datas are gathered in gamification scenarios. For the Virtual Bodies Residency, Yarli will experiment with using the metaverse of gamification as a fictitious tool and window to examine the gender health data gap. This work will contribute to Yarli’s ‘digital humanity series’; Datafication.
The Residency will take place in early September with a discussion event taking place late September / early October as part of the Peer to Peer: UK/HK 2022 Festival. Keep an eye on our socials (@BOMLab) to find out more…
