Author Archives: Niio

Niio in 2022: the interviews

Niio Editorial

As we reach the end of 2022, we look back at a very busy year, and forward to an even more intense 2023. In this series of posts, we have selected some of our favorite artcasts, artists, artworks, articles, and interviews. They outline an overview of what has happened in Niio over the last months and highlight the work of artists and galleries with whom we are proud to collaborate. However, there is much more than what fits in this page! We invite you to browse our app and discover our curated art program, as well as our editorial section.

Five interviews from 2022

Interviews are an important part of our Editorial content, because we believe that artists, gallerists, and curators have important things to say, and we want their words to reach our readers. We are privileged to live in a time when it is possible to connect with people around the world and have a conversation with them, learn from their experience and get a first person account of their creative process. This year we have spoken to wonderful and generous art professionals who have spent time with us explaining their work and their views on digital art, sometimes at a distance, and other times visiting their studios. These conversations are certainly worth reading for anyone who wishes to understand how art is created nowadays.

We have chosen five interviews from almost 40 conversations published in our Editorial section this year. Click on the titles to read each article.

Photo: Joanna Holloway

Steve Sacks founded bitforms in New York in November 2001, at a time when digital art was getting attention among the contemporary art institutions in the USA as well as Europe. Major exhibitions held that same year, such as Bitstreams and Data Dynamics at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and 010101: Art in Technological Times at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art were particularly inspirational for him.

Photo: Joanna Holloway

Over two decades, bitforms has achieved an influential position in the contemporary art market as a gallery devoted to digital art, participating in major art fairs and representing some of the most recognized artists in this field, such as Manfred Mohr, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Casey Reas, Quayola, Auriea Harvey, Refik Anadol, Gary Hill, Claudia Hart, Beryl Korot, Marina Zurkow, Daniel Canogar, Daniel Rozin, Siebren Versteeg and many others. On the occasion of the third series of Niio Commissions, which was curated by Sacks, we sat down with the gallerist to discuss his views on the development of the contemporary art market and the role that digital art is now playing in it.

“Niio gives my artists more exposure and it’s much easier for collectors to view and manage their artworks”

Steven Sacks

Marina Zurkow, artist

Marina Zurkow’s work explores the relationship between nature, culture, and society, focusing on what she describes as “wicked problems,” those issues that reveal our abusive interactions with the natural environment and our difficulty to understand it beyond our human-centric, capitalist-driven views of the world around us.

A transdisciplinary artist, she works with experts from different fields to create a wide range of artistic practices that includes video art, installations, and public participatory projects. Currently, she is working on the tensions between maritime ecology and the ocean’s primary human use as a capitalist Pangea.

Following the release of two new artworks commissioned by Niio, we spoke with the artist about her latest work and her commitment to raise environmental concerns through her art.

“There are many roles that artists occupy in terms of addressing environmental atrocities. I don’t feel like any one tactic is any better than any other. It’s all crucial.”

Marina Zurkow

Daniel Canogar, artist

The leading artist in the Spanish media art scene, Daniel Canogar‘s influential work spans almost four decades and a wide range of media from video art installations to generative software art. On the occasion of his solo artcast Liquid Data, our Senior Curator Pau Waelder interviewed him in his studio in Madrid.

“My work as a media artist is about trying to think of data, of sculpture, of the history of art, in a synchronous way where it all comes together.”

Daniel Canogar

Tamiko Thiel, artist

Tamiko Thiel is a pioneering visual artist exploring the interplay of place, space, the body and cultural identity in works encompassing an artificial intelligence (AI) supercomputer, objects, installations, digital prints in 2D and 3D, videos, interactive 3d virtual worlds (VR), augmented reality (AR) and artificial intelligence art.

We had a conversation with the artist on the occasion of the launch of her solo artcast Invisible Nature curated by DAM Projects, in which she discusses the evolution of technology over the last three decades, her early AR artworks and her commitment to create art that invites reflection.

“What is truly the value of an artist making work about a subject such as these is that the art work can be exhibited time and time again, in different places around the world.”

Tamiko Thiel

Patrick Tresset, artist

Patrick Tresset is an artist who explores a form of mediated creation in which his drawing style is transferred to a set of robotic drawing machines or applied to video footage to create artworks that are curiously algorithmic and spontaneous at the same time. He is also the co-founder of alterHEN, an eco-friendly NFT platform and artist community whose artists have participated in a previous artcast on Niio. Tresset has also presented his series Human Study in a solo artcast launched recently.

Our Senior Curator Pau Waelder interviewed him in his studio in Brussels on the occasion of his visit to the Art Brussels art fair. They discussed his work and the series that originated from an exhibition in Hong Kong that he had to remotely orchestrate during lockdown.

“So there is this weird thing with control, because in the beginning I have control, but then when the robots start, I don’t have any control. And that leads to an interesting form of spontaneity.”

Patrick Tresset

Niio in 2022: the artworks

Niio Editorial

As we reach the end of 2022, we look back at a very busy year, and forward to an even more intense 2023. In this series of posts, we have selected some of our favorite artcasts, artists, artworks, articles, and interviews. They outline an overview of what has happened in Niio over the last months and highlight the work of artists and galleries with whom we are proud to collaborate. However, there is much more than what fits in this page! We invite you to browse our app and discover our curated art program, as well as our editorial section.

Five artworks from 2022

Screens have become the canvas of the 21st century. Artists display their creativity in digital artworks that are meant to exist on a screen, sometimes inside a web browser or even a mobile app. We believe that artworks are better experienced and appreciated in a dedicated screen, and therefore our whole system enables setting up a screen at home or anywhere that becomes a space for art. Within this space, many things can happen: the images that appear on the screen can be painstakingly created through 3D modeling, or drawn using a generative algorithm. They can also consist of video footage mixed with hyper-realistic CGI elements. They can be abstract or build a precise narrative, and they can be crafted from scratch or appropriated from an external source. It is quite impossible to describe everything that an artist can create digitally and that fits on a screen, as it is defining everything that a painting on canvas can be.

We have chosen five artworks from more than 230 moving image artworks and 185 photographs featured in our curated art program this year. Click on the artists’ names to find out more about their work.

Yoshi Sodeoka. Synthetic Liquid 8, 2022

Supported by a hybrid creative process that is both analog and digital, Sodeoka deploys an unconventional artistic approach that challenges the video medium. While questioning the major issues of visual media, its perception, and the interpretation of the world in the digital age, the work navigates narrative universes with singularly ultra-guided aesthetics. “Synthetic Liquid” depicts organic forms and blatant colors that open a portal to psychedelic and illusory world far from reality.

A multifaceted artist, Yoshi Sodeoka creates a wide range of audiovisual artistic works that include video art, animated gifs, music videos, and editorial illustrations. Influenced from an early stage in his career in noise music and glitch art, as well as avant garde movements such as Op Art, his work is characterized by breaking down the structure of the musical score and visual integrity of the image to find new forms of artistic expression.

Driessens & Verstappen. Kennemerduinen 2010, scene H, 2011

Kennemerduinen 2010, is a project for which the artists documented six locations around the Kennemer dunes (near the North Sea). Each film has a duration of almost nine minutes and covers exactly one year, from one January to the next. On a weekly basis, each scene was repeatedly photographed from the same position and at the same time of day, around noon. With custom developed software each series of shots was edited into fluid transitions. Slow transformations and changes in season, that are never directly perceptible in daily life, are perceptible on a sensory level. By systematically computerising and formalising observation, the Kennemer dunes films became studies of the spontaneous course of nature, of the emergent and entropic processes underlying it.

In the past years Driessens & Verstappen have documented three different types of Dutch landscapes: a historic landscape park (Frankendael 2001), a dike landscape (Diemerzeedijk 2007) and a dune landscape (Kennemerduinen 2010). From each landscape type several films are made.

Katie Torn. Dream Flower I, 2022

“Dream Flower I” is a 3D animation that depicts a snoozing biomorphic female arrangement made out of flowers, leaves and pipes. As the creature sleeps, a plastic like liquid flows from the pipes creating a relaxing fountain. The work is inspired by Victorian botanical illustrations.

Katie Torn’s work explores the female figure in a world shaped by digital technology and obsession with self-image boosted by social media and consumer culture. She uses 3D graphics and video to build assemblages of natural and artificial elements that question the boundaries between beauty and decay, body and prosthesis, organic and synthetic, and between a person’s own self and the image she creates of herself. 

Julian Brangold. Observation Machine (Iteration), 2022

A sculpture depicting a seating man is multiplied six times, the copies rotating in a choreographed fashion. Colored in a pink hue, the sculptures resemble consumer products, souvenirs lined up on a shelf waiting to be purchased. At the same time, the artist applies an effect that makes the sculptures come to pieces, as if an invisible hand were trying to touch them but destroyed them in the process.

Julian Brangold (Buenos Aires, 1986) is one of the leading names in the growing digital art community in Argentina. Through painting, computer programming, 3D modeling, video installations, collage, and a myriad of digital mediums, he addresses how technologies such as artificial intelligence and data processing are shaping our culture and memory, as well as our notion of self. An active participant in the cryptoart scene and NFT market in Argentina he has been exploring art on the blockchain since 2020 and is currently the Director of Programming at  Museum of Crypto Art, a web3 native cultural institution.

Julie Blackmon. New Neighbors, 2020

Courtesy the artist and Fahey-Klein gallery

Julie Blackmon (b. 1966) is an American photographer who lives and works in Missouri. As an art student at Missouri State University, Blackmon became interested in photography, especially the work of Diane Arbus and Sally Mann. Blackmon’s oeuvre also shows influences from Masters of the Dutch Renaissance such as Jan Steen.

Niio Art in collaboration with Fahey/Klein Gallery recently published an Artcast of Julie Blackmon’s photography works in digital format. The artist focuses on the complexities and contradictions of modern life, exploring, among other subjects, the overwhelming, often conflicting expectations and obligations of contemporary parenthood. Blackmon has stated that her works deal with “modern parenting, and the contradictions and expectations and the overwhelmed feeling that go with parenting today as compared to the past” furthermore the artist has stated “with the little ones it’s more metaphorical than about parenting, and speaks of the anxieties of everyday modern life”.

Niio in 2022: the artists

Niio Editorial

As we reach the end of 2022, we look back at a very busy year, and forward to an even more intense 2023. In this series of posts, we have selected some of our favorite artcasts, artists, artworks, articles, and interviews. They outline an overview of what has happened in Niio over the last months and highlight the work of artists and galleries with whom we are proud to collaborate. However, there is much more than what fits in this page! We invite you to browse our app and discover our curated art program, as well as our editorial section.

Five artists from 2022

We created Niio for artists. As the creators of the artworks, which are the key element around which revolves the whole art world, they are fundamental to the existence and the development of contemporary art. Digital artists have long faced a lack of recognition and understanding of their work, paired with the difficulties of disseminating art in a digital format while retaining control of it. At Niio we help them share their art with a wider audience, sell it with the assistance of their galleries, and explain their creative process, all while keeping full control of their work. This year our curated art program has dedicated 42 artcasts to present the work of a single artist, and we have carried out almost 40 interviews that dive deeper into their practice.

We have chosen five artists from more than 80 featured in our curated art program this year. Click on their names to find out more about their work.

Dagmar Schürrer

Dagmar Schürrer, We are already history, and we don’t know it, 2021.

Dagmar Schürrer is an Austrian digital artist based in Berlin, Germany. She holds a degree in Fine Art from Central Saint Martin´s College in London, UK. She assembles digitally generated objects and animations, text and sound to form intricate video sound montages, presented on screen, as installations or combined with new technologies such as augmented reality. She is a research assistant at the University for Applied Sciences Berlin, where she teaches AR technologies and supports the production of AR applications in the field of art and culture. As a board member of the Berlin media art association (medienkunstverein) she is committed to supporting new forms of presentation of contemporary new media art. This year she has presented on Niio the solo artcast Parallel Realities.

Dagmar Schürrer is represented by Artemis Gallery (Lisbon).

Andreas Nicholas Fischer

Andreas Nicolas Fischer, Nethervoid 07 L 2180, 2022

Andreas Nicolas Fischer is a multidisciplinary artist from Berlin. Fischer started his artistic career as a traditional artist working mainly with painting and drawing, but became interested in generative art upon his visit to artist Casey Reas’ Process/Drawing exhibition in 2005 at DAM Gallery in Berlin. While he did not have a background in computing, Fischer was motivated to teach himself code and started creating animations with Processing. He also worked briefly with fabrication and sculpture to adapt to the demands of the market at a time when the interest in digital art was not yet mainstream. However, he considers himself a purist and likes to create systems that operate autonomously, something that he can achieve by working with generative algorithms.

This year he has presented on Niio the solo artcast The Art of Hypnosis.

Eva Papamargariti

Eva Papamargariti, As they were drifting away, their bodies turned into waves, 2022.

Eva Papamargariti is an artist based between Athens and London with a background in Architecture and the Visual Arts. The artist’s artistic practice focuses on creating 2D and 3D rendered spaces that ultimately blur the boundaries between physical and digital environments. Moreover, her practice focuses mainly on the moving image but she has also worked with prints and sculptural installations. Papamargariti’s works deal with the interactions between humans, nature, and technology which define our identity and everyday experiences. The artist’s works have been exhibited at different institutions on an international level including at The New Museum in New York, The Whitney Museum, New York, and Tate Britain in London.

This year she has presented on Niio the solo artcast Things Will Become Weirder.

Matteo Zamagni

Matteo Zamagni, Unison – 02, 2022

Matteo Zamagni is a multi-disciplinary artist who works across the visual arts, electronic music, multimedia installations, and film production. Using analytical geoscientific tools, VR/AR/MR, real-time generative imaging, photogrammetry, and CGI techniques Zamagni explores the complexities of the different crises that define our contemporary age and society. Zamagni’s artistic production is characterized by the exposure of the interrelations between nature and technology through machine-driven visual artworks. This year he has presented on Niio the solo artcasts Experiences of Synchrony and Thought Experiments.

Matteo Zamagni is represented by Gazelli Art House (London).

Fabio Catapano

Fabio Catapano, Colorem 221201, 2022

Fabio Catapano is an Italian digital artist and designer who works with code, CGI, and motion. He has a degree in digital sociology and anthropology, and with his work focusing on the relationship between society and technology, he attempts to create digital images that feel poetic and meditative. Fabio’s expansive work has been exhibited in Paris, Brussels, London and many other cities. He has also been part of the first Italian NFT auction organized by the auction house Cambi and SuperRare. And, he has been nominated as one of the ten most influential NFTs artists in Italy. Fabio collaborated with brands such as Nike and Apple.

This year he has presented on Niio the solo artcast A Theory of Color.

Niio in 2022: the artcasts

Niio Editorial

As we reach the end of 2022, we look back at a very busy year, and forward to an even more intense 2023. In this series of posts, we have selected some of our favorite artcasts, artists, artworks, articles, and interviews. They outline an overview of what has happened in Niio over the last months and highlight the work of artists and galleries with whom we are proud to collaborate. However, there is much more than what fits in this page! We invite you to browse our app and discover our curated art program, as well as our editorial section.

Five artcasts from 2022

Our curated virtual exhibitions are characterized by their flexibility to bring art in a digital format to any screen, at the homes of collectors and art fans, as well as in the framework of international exhibitions. This year, we have featured commissioned artworks by outstanding artists, participated in the ISEA2022 Barcelona International Symposium of Electronic Arts among other events, and introduced photography artcasts with celebrated photographers in collaboration with Fahey-Klein gallery.

We have chosen five artcasts from almost 60 launched since March this year, featuring the work of more than 80 artists. Click on the titles to explore each selection.

Snow Yunxue Fu, Karst, 2019

Possibles

Niio joined the exhibitions of the ISEA2022 Barcelona 27th International Symposium on Electronic Art with a selection of artworks addressing the main themes of the symposium. The screen-based works address the notion of possibles in different ways, from the dynamics of microscopic particulate matter to the global effects of climate change, from new worlds we could inhabit to those that are fading away, and from our individual perception of the world to the realization that even machines can forget. Participating artists: Frederik de Wilde, Diane Drubay, Jeppe Lange, Sabrina Ratté, Antoine Schmitt, and Snow Yunxue Fu.

Frederik de Wilde, Hunter and Dog_Octree #1, 2021

Chiseled in Code: II

Artists create with the weight of art history on their shoulders. The canons from Antiquity, the Renaissance, the Baroque and Neoclassical periods, as well as Modernity have shaped the perception of the Fine Arts and the objects that an artist is supposed to create. Artists nowadays have the possibility, through digital technologies, to incorporate, remix, and reshape the art from the past in order to create new artworks that question the need for a static piece of marble or a canvas, and instead present an ongoing process. Participating artists: Quayola, Daniel Canogar, Frederik de Wilde, and Julian Brangold.

Steve Schapiro. Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick and Entourage, New York, 1965

Steve Schapiro

A selection of photographs by Steve Schapiro (1934-2022), one of the most prominent figures of documentary photography in the United States, initiated our series of photography artcasts curated by Nicholas Fahey, owner of Fahey-Klein gallery in Los Angeles. Devoted to photojournalism from a young age, he worked as a freelance photographer for Life and other magazines such as Time, Newsweek, the Saturday Evening Post and Paris Match. An exceptional witness of the civil rights movement, his camera captured key moments in American history with a sharp eye and caring attention to the subjects of his portraits. 

Carla Gannis, Flowering City, 2022

Carla Gannis: Theories of Everything

In this series of works, artist Carla Gannis and her avatar C.A.R.L.A.G.A.N. travel around different parts of the world, in the city, and the countryside scanning and recording their experiences. The artist references historical philosophers, thinkers, and artists considering developments and similarities between the past and the future, between the pre-digital and the post-digital ages. The artworks represented derive from a series of 3D LiDAR scans taken from the artist’s iPhone, which are then recreated into fragmentary sceneries through a multimedia process that includes post-photography, 3D animation, digital painting, and AI generated imagery.

Yuge Zhou, Interlinked I, 2022

Yuge Zhou: Interlinked

The pace at which city dwellers move is faster the bigger the city is. This was already proven by Marc and Helen Bornstein in their often quoted essay The Pace of Life from 1979, and has become much more clear nowadays, when our physical movements in the city are paired with a relentless digital activity. Yuge Zhou revisits her exploration of urban environments and the flows of commuters in these two commissioned artworks creating video collages of passersby in different U.S. cities, walking on sidewalks or rushing through subway stations. The collage technique allows her to create repetitions and create a sense of rhythm in these observations of daily life. “Interlinked I” and “Interlinked II” are part of the Niio Commissions Vol. 3

Digital art brings a new ambiance to the travel industry 

Nico Tone, the artists collective behind the beautiful art installation powered by Niio, explain the story of the artwork curated for Hong Kong International Airport and how it enhances travelers’ experience in the terminal. 

Niio Editorial

View of Nico Tone’s Botanic Dreams next to the Waterfall Gardens at Hong Kong International Airport

Traveling is not just going from one place to another. Every step of the trip is an experience in itself. Granted, maybe packing and getting to the airport is a bit stressful. But once you cross the security checkpoint and find that you have some time to spend before your flight takes off, it is like discovering a new city. Airports are now a long way from the gray, boxy, nondescript buildings that travelers had to cross to get to their planes. They now offer spectacular architectural spaces, a myriad of places to shop, eat, or drink, and also some quiet spots to relax, recharge, and get ready for the next part of the trip.

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Some airports are known for being particularly comfortable, or for the array of services they offer. Tallinn Airport, for instance, is known for its cozy atmosphere that makes one feel at home, and in fact, it was voted by its passengers the Best Airport in Europe in 2019. Munich Airport is the second busiest airport in Germany, catering to its passengers with more than 150 stores and 50 places to eat. However, few can rival the spectacular interior spaces of Hong Kong International Airport at Chek Lap Kok.

Hong Kong International Airport, which opened in 1998, connects to 220 destinations worldwide and handled 71.5 million passengers in 2019. The airport that never sleeps has been awarded more than 80 ‘World’s Best Airport’ awards and is committed to becoming one of the world’s greenest airports. 

At Hong Kong International Airport, large screens offer visitors immersive virtual environments that enhance the feeling of traveling and the excitement of reaching new destinations

Walking through its ample corridors and immense vaulted spaces filled with light is a memorable experience in itself, but there is even more to explore as the airport buildings extend the physical space with multimedia installations. Large screens offer visitors immersive virtual environments that enhance the feeling of traveling and the excitement of reaching new destinations.

The multimedia experience began with the Waterfall Gardens, developed in collaboration with Moment Factory, to create a relaxing and beautifully magical ambiance in the terminal. The installation simulates a waterfall falling into a river with rocks. Visitors are invited to walk along the river and touch the water on the screen, feeling transported to a faraway land for a brief moment.

Next to the Waterfall Gardens, is the airport’s latest innovative installation powered by Niio. A giant screen hosts the artworks Botanic Dreams, Awakening Garden and Ikebana Dreams #1 by Nico Tone, a multidisciplinary group formed by creatives from different nationalities, who work together on art and technology projects. 

Nico Tone, Awakening Garden, 2019

Nico Tone’s senior artist and co-founder Tal Keren explains the process behind conceiving an artwork for this spectacular setting. The artists’ group’s initial challenge has been to create something that draws the attention of passersby in an environment saturated with visual messages. “We are confronted daily with many images and videos,” states Keren, “and nothing really infiltrates us or touches us anymore. I believe that if you take the time and look at one artwork you will start feeling and sensing its power. This is what we try to achieve.” 

Nico Tone, Ikebana Dreams #1, 2019

Nature is chosen as a subject by the artists to convey a positive message that reaches out across cultures and identities

The artists’ collective creates an engaging visual space that allows for a more relaxed contemplation, observing every detail in the scene and noticing subtle changes that happen every now and then. Contrary to the quick impact sought by advertising content, which catches the eye and delivers its message in a fraction of a second, these works invite the viewer to take their time. The compositions created by the artists are, accordingly, depictions of nature and peaceful landscapes that contain within them numerous small events, happening at different times, so that the image appears to be full of a life of its own.

Nature is chosen as a subject by the artists to convey a positive message that reaches out across cultures and identities: “We don’t want our viewers to relate an artwork to one culture or to one language,” stresses Keren, “but instead wish for every viewer to have their own take and perception of the artwork.”

Nico Tone, Botanic Dreams 1, 2020

Working on the large screen of this installation has been an interesting challenge for Nico Tone. As Tal mentions: “On very large screens, every detail is seen and scrutinized. Everything needs to be meticulous and have meaning. We have to simultaneously consider both the viewer looking at the colossal screen from very close and one looking from far away. We aspire to convey the message or story of the artwork for both these types of viewers.” She concludes by confessing that “it is both scary and extremely satisfying to present our works on these huge screens.”   

Niio X SOUTH SOUTH: showcasing video art from the Global South

This month we want to highlight our meaningful partnership with SOUTH SOUTH on its second edition of VEZA. SOUTH SOUTH is an online community, an anthology, an archive and a resource for artists, galleries, curators and collectors, institutions and non-profits invested in the Global South. 

VEZA 02 features a digital showcase of seminal video art from the Global South which coincided with the April 2022 edition of SP–Arte in Brazil. An exclusively designed installation powered by Niio was set up at the fair, presenting selected video art works.

Nicolás Paris, Desvío (2017). Installation view SP-Arte.

SOUTH SOUTH Veza takes its name from the isiZulu word which means “to show, produce, or reveal” and presents its audience with a new way to experience and engage with new media artworks.

VEZA 02 also boasted a robust curated art programme titled Bending the Axis. This year’s programme was curated by Meyken Barreto, Uche James Iroha, and the curatorial duo Carlos Quijon, Jr. & Kathleen Ditzig and was made possible with the generosity of Mr. Jorge M. Perez and the inaugural SOUTH SOUTH x El Espacio 23 Curatorial Residency. It included works by emerging and established artists and a Talks Programme engaging cultural practitioners from across the globe which took place from 31 March – 10 April 2022.

Veza 02 focuses on digital and video art, and the remarkable possibilities of new media, as well as its core activity of facilitating new connections within the cultural ecosystems across the Global South and beyond.

Galleries from 25 cities spread across five continents came together to present a selling exhibition of important video artworks at SP–Arte (Sāo Paulo) and simultaneously online. This marked SOUTH SOUTH ’s transition into a hybrid model through collaboration with regional fairs.

Niio supported and powered both the physical exhibition and the online presentation through our state of the art technology platform which enables new media to be preserved, certified and seamlessly acquired through Niio and the Blockchain, with an accompanying NFT.

Coco Fusco, The Empty Plaza/ La Plaza Vacia, (2012). Installation view SP-Arte.

SOUTH SOUTH offers a repository and a space for new, shared value systems centered on community, collaboration and exchange. It is a central portal to experience the programs and artist profiles of galleries within and dedicated to the Global South.

The SOUTH SOUTH platform was conceived by Liza Essers, owner of Goodman Gallery as a response to the global pandemic and as an extension to an ongoing curatorial initiative established by Goodman Gallery in 2015.

Niio facilitates and enables the acquisition of new media and video art works and ownership through our highly advanced platform offering storage and preservation of digital works, securing NFT & blockchain technology for provenance and attribution, and providing the best in class display technology for showcasing screen based works, in-turn enabling art spaces and arts practitioners to shape their own narratives within the cluttered and developing conversations about the relationship between art, new technology and web3.

With the help of Niio, SOUTH SOUTH also launched the VEZA NEW MEDIA FUND which allows museums focused on the Global South and diaspora to acquire new media works from galleries taking part in VEZA for their collections.

This year’s beneficiary was El Museo del Barrio, New York’s leading Latino cultural institution. Niio together with SOUTH SOUTH has launched a $40,000 fund through which El Museo Del Barrio has acquired two new digital artworks: one that addresses the erosion of civil liberties by the high-profile Cuban-American artist Coco Fusco — The Empty Plaza/ La Plaza Vacia, 2012, represented by Alexander Gray Associates. Centrally located public squares are a key component of social and political life throughout Latin America, Caribbean cities, and the rest of the world. In The Empty Plaza/ La Plaza Vacia, artist Coco Fusco, inspired by the Arab Spring protests of 2011 explores discussions among Cubans about the reason that plazas were left vacant. In this work the Plaza de la Revolución in Havana becomes the protagonist in the artist’s mediation on public space, memory and revolutionary promise.

The second artwork acquired by El Museo Del Barrio through the Veza New Media Fund is Siboney, 2014 by the 32-year-old Dominican-American artist Joiri Minaya represented by Embajada gallery. The work Siboney is at once a mural painting and a performance in which the artist hand-painted the design of a found fabric onto a museum wall. The video work is accompanied by the song Siboney by Connie Francis composed by Ernesto Lecuona in 1929 allegedly while homesick, away from Cuba. Once the artist finished painting the mural she pours water on herself and scrubs the mural with her body while dancing to Siboney in doing so questioning the exoticism in the representation of black and brown women in the Caribbean, and to challenge these constructions and the control of the Other historically in order to reclaim the voice of these women.

Both video artworks were sold together with their accompanying NFT through Niio Art, and have been transferred to the museum via the Niio pro tool platform. We invite you to discover the VEZA exhibition and available artworks through Niio’s digital online catalog. We hereby want to give a special thanks to all participating featured artists and galleries:

Patfudyda / Abre Alas 17 A Gentil Carioca, São Paulo / Rio de Janeiro

Coco Fusco Alexander Gray Associates, New York City / Germantown

Luis Enrique López-Chávez Bode Projects, Berlin

Gigi Scaria Chemould Prescott Road, Mumbai

Jackie Karuti Circle Art Gallery, Nairobi

Joiri Minaya Embajada, San Juan

Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, São Paulo / Rio de Janeiro

Eder Santos Galeria Luciana Brito, São Paulo

Nicolás Paris Galeria Luisa Strina, São Paulo

Nalini Malani Galerie Lelong & Co., New York City / Paris

Kiluanji Kia Henda Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg / Cape Town / London

Peter Nelson Hanart TZ Gallery, Hong Kong 

Zheng Chongbin INKstudio, Beijing

Hardeep Pandhal Jhaveri Contemporary, Mumbai

Wura-Natasha Ogunji kó, Lagos

Minerva Cuevas kurimanzutto, Mexico City / New York City

Yazan Khalili Lawrie Shabibi, Dubai

Letícia Ramos Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo / Brussels / New York City

Tsubasa Kato MUJIN-TO Production, Tokyo

Amina Benbouchta OH Gallery, Dakar

Jorge Méndez Blake OMR, Mexico City

Miguel Angel Rios Sicardi Ayers Bacino, Houston

Ayrson Heráclito Southern Stars Projects, London

Charles Lim Yi Yong STPI – Creative Workshop & Gallery, Singapore  

Ryoko Aoki Take Ninagawa, Tokyo

Sara Ramo Travesia Cuatro, Madrid / Guadalajara / Mexico City

Atul Bhalla Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi