Digital Carnival Z

April 21 – June 30, 2021

Traditional, unceded territories of the hǝn̓q̓ ǝmin̓ ǝm̓ speaking peoples (Richmond, BC) | Online

And….that’s a wrap!

Thank you for being part of Digital Carnival Z. The festival is now at an end. We invite you to explore this website as a record of the festival programming that took place between April 21, 2021 and June 30, 2021, and our attempt to create an accessible online media art festival experience. We’ll be sharing our notes, findings, and resources in the months to come!

If you wish to access artworks from the festival for research purposes, please contact our Associate Curator, Minah Lee at minah@cinevolutionmedia.com.

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Media

An exhibition space, the walls are covered in black wrinkled plastic. There is a screen on the left side wall, showing a close-up of a face in a bright blue hue. There's a white sculpture on a base across the screen and behind it there's an installation of red partitions hanging from the ceiling. — Nancy Lee 李南屏 and Kiran Bhumber ਕਿਰਨਦੀਪ ਕੌਰ ਭੰਬਰ, “UNION” (2021). Photo credit: Michael Love.

In Spring 2021, Digital Carnival Z took place as a hybrid festival for the first time, with the Featured Artist Exhibition — UNION Nancy Lee 李南屏 and Kiran Bhumber ਕਿਰਨਦੀਪ ਕੌਰ ਭੰਬਰ — at the Richmond Art Gallery and the rest of the exhibits online. The festival explored alternative conceptions of the relationship between bodies, gestures, culture and society. Missed the festival? Read about Digital Carnival Z in the media.

See the festival’s Press Roundup

Artists

Courage is wearing a yellow tube top and white hairband, she's posing with her two balled fists up and looking straight into the mirror. Her expressive face is reflected on a big mirror with red frame. — Natasha “Courage” Bacchus, “Reflection of ME (2021)”, video still. Image courtesy of the artist.

Discover the festival artists. Digital Carnival Z was headlined by featured artists Nancy Lee 李南屏 and Kiran Bhumber ਕਿਰਨਦੀਪ ਕੌਰ ਭੰਬਰ and their immersive transmedia sci-fi exhibition UNION. We were also honoured to welcome artworks and presentations from Natasha “Courage” Bacchus, Margaret Dragu and Justine A. Chambers, Danielle Mackenzie Long, Mickey L.D. Morgan, Kofi Oduro, Juli Saragosa, Lena Chen, Mallory Donen, Sarah Shamash, Angelic Goldsky, Gina Goico, Rye and Skim.

Learn more about the artists

Projects

Collage in blues, greens, and yellow of coding artwork by artist — Digital Exploration of the Expansion, Kofi Oduro, 2021, still. Image courtesy of the artist.

Explore the artworks through the audio festival experience or by visiting the project pages. The festival invited artists to consider access for various disability communities and to work with us to weave access considerations into the presentation of their work. Our fledgling efforts were not always successful and we are deeply indebted to the artists, access providers, and community for their ongoing feedback and collaboration. (Our reflections on this experience will be shared in an upcoming research report.)

Learn more about the projects

Curator’s Statement

When I was a young adult living in South Korea, an online fortune-teller told me that I would have had a much better life if I were born male. Even though this forecast could have been true for any non-cisman in my culture, I felt personally discouraged. It was many years later that I started realizing that the algorithmic machine response based on the data I provided about me was not neutral from the power that shapes the automated message. How does it feel to be stuck in societal expectations and readings of who I can be? What is it like to be processed by a set of rules that are hostile to who you are?

Read Minah Lee’s full curatorial statement

Minah Lee, Curator