Istanbul native Refik Anadol is a media artist, director and pioneer in the aesthetics of machine intelligence. His body of work puts creativity at the intersection of humans and machines. Using data as his primary material, he creates site-specific sculptures, live audio/visual performances and immersive installations that encourage us to rethink our engagement with the physical world, its temporal and spatial dimensions and the creative potential of machines.

He  operates Refik Anadol Studio and RAS LAB,   in Los Angeles, California; the Studio’s research practice centered around discovering and developing trailblazing approaches to data narratives and artificial intelligence. Anadol is also a lecturer for UCLA’s Department of Design Media Arts from which he obtained his Master of Fine Arts.

 Anadol’s body of work addresses the challenges, and the possibilities, that ubiquitous computing has imposed on humanity, and what it means to be a human in the age of AI. He explores how the perception and experience of time and space are radically changing now that machines dominate our everyday lives. Anadol is intrigued by the ways in which the digital age and machine intelligence allow for a new aesthetic technique to create enriched immersive environments that offer a dynamic perception of space.

By proposing the possibility of “post-digital architecture,” Anadol invites his audience to imagine alternative realities by re-defining the functionalities of both interior and exterior architectural elements. He tackles this by moving beyond the integration of media into built forms and translating the logic of a new media technology into art and design.

Residing at the crossroads of art, science, and technology, Anadol’s site-specific three-dimensional data sculptures and paintings, live audio/visual performances, and immersive installations take varied virtual and physical forms. Entire buildings come to life, floors, walls, and ceilings disappear into infinity, breathtaking aesthetics take shape from large swaths of data, and what was once invisible to the human eye becomes visible, offering the audience a new perspective on, and narrative of their worlds.

A pioneer in his field, and the first to use artificial intelligence in a public immersive artwork, Anadol has partnered with teams at Microsoft, Google, Nvidia, Intel, IBM, Panasonic, JPL/NASA, Siemens, Epson, MIT, Harvard, UCLA, Stanford University, and UCSF, to apply the latest, cutting-edge science, research and technologies to his body of work.

Topics

• Art in The Age of Machine Intelligence
•  In The Mind’s Eye
• Transformation of Art
• Space in the Mind of A Machine

 Awards

• Lorenzo il Magnifico Lifetime Achievement Award for New Media Art
• Microsoft Research’s Best Vision Award
• Lumen Prize Award
• iF Gold Award
• D&AD Pencil Award
• German Design Award
• UCLA Art+Architecture Moss Award
• Columbia University’s Breakthrough in Storytelling Award
• University of California Institute for Research in the Arts Award
• SEGD Global Design Award
• Google’s Artists and Machine Intelligence Artist Residency Award.