Join us for an Artist Panel related to the themes of our current exhibition 女 Nǚ: Other Half of The Sky featuring artists Angel Chen, Jiabao Li, Lex Miller and Kara Stone in conversation with curators Xiaowei Wang and Qianqian Ye.

Our discussion will think through the intersection of labor, identity and technology. Against the dominant narratives of automation and the purported magic of technology, through our conversation we will examine the ways tech can create normative forms of being and shape virtual phenomenologies — obfuscating labor, the body and care. Extending the connections of labor and technology, we'll touch upon the role of labor and process in creative work, as artists working with new media and technology situated both inside and outside tech, and what forms of futurity and visibility might look like.

Doors: 6:00pm
Panel and Discussion: 7:00pm

Artist Bios:
Born in Taipei, Angel Chen holds a Bachelor of Arts from McGill University in Philosophy and Computer Science and a Masters of Science in Art, Culture, and Technology from MIT. Her project-based practice takes various forms including video, installation, workshop, and publication. Her recent work investigates the production infrastructure in art versus in science and technology. She has exhibited with and participated in residency programs at institutions including The Banff Centre (Banff, Canada), Plug In ICA (Winnipeg, Canada), HB STATION Contemporary Art Research Center (Guangzhou, China), Bi-City Biennale Of UrbanismArchitecture (Shenzhen, China), and Chinese Culture Center of San Francisco.
http://angelchen.ca

Jiabao Li (李佳宝) works at the intersection of emerging technology, art and design, and creates new ways for humans to perceive the world. Her research-based projects range from wearables, projections, drones and installations to scientific experiments, and they explore how technology is transforming our perception, identity, emotion, and sensation. Jiabao graduated from Harvard Graduate School of Design with a Master of Design in Technology with Distinction and best thesis award, and from National University of Singapore with a Master of Electrical Engineering. She is currently a prototyping designer at Apple, inventing and exploring new products, interfaces, and technologies.
https://www.jiabaoli.org

Kara Stone is an artist and scholar interested in the affective and gendered experiences of psychosocial disability, debility, and healing as it relates to art production, particularly videogames. Her artwork has been featured in The Atlantic, Wired, and Vice. She is a member of the Different Games Collective. She holds a BFA in Film Production and master’s degree in Communication and Culture from York University, and is currently a PhD student in Film and Digital Media with a designated emphasis in Feminist Studies at University of California at Santa Cruz. You can find her games on Steam, iOS app store, and Google Play.
http://karastone.itch.io

Lexi Miller, a San Francisco based artist, considers herself a creative dabbler. She typically cross-pollinates visual and fine art elements into most projects that she does. She works as an engineer in the automated manufacturing/robotics sector and have since noticed the design principles in engineering (functionality/logicality/efficiency/geometry/simplicity) that have trickled into her creative work. She is most satisfied when working with tangible mediums. She is part of Undertone Collective, a collection of artists of color, who make up a multidisciplinary arts initiative creating audio, visual, written, and illustrated content. All of their work is created with women of color in mind — they value radical vulnerability and creating space for women of color to share intimate stories about their lives. In addition to producing podcasts and hosting events, we publish a zine full of stories, photos, illustrations and poetry.
https://www.mellafiasco.com
https://www.undertonecollective.com

Xiaowei Wang is a designer, engineer and researcher. Their work focuses on the centrality of landscape and ecology in a digital world, building inquiry and community through public art, data visualization and writing. They have co-founded a number of award-winning design projects, including FLOAT Beijing, an air quality sensing kite initiative, which was an INDEX Design to Improve Life Finalist. Their current research focus is technology use in rural China, Sinofuturism and the intersection of food systems and technology. Other work includes data visualization for the UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism while at Situ Research, and creating the Nomadic Mapping Collective as a selected artist The U.S. Department of State/ZERO1's American Arts Incubator program. Currently, they serve as Creative Director of Logic Magazine.
http://xiaoweiwang.com

Qianqian Ye is a Chinese born and raised artist/designer/curator based in the Bay Area. Emerging from an architecture background, she explores the complexities of human interaction in various media including installation, performance, and ink. Qianqian cofounded ONiON Collective, focusing on the US-China Art and Tech exchange. As one of the Processing Foundation 2019 fellows, Qianqian’s project is to make creative coding more accessible in China, especially within the underrepresented womxn groups. Her works have been shown at Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, Ecobuild London, Killscreen Magazine and various exhibitions in the US and China.
http://www.qianqian-ye.com

The exhibition for 女 Nǚ: Other Half of The Sky will be on view, and highlights the trans-Pacific flows of labor between Asia and the SF Bay Area. The show is centered on themes of technology and gender, and the invisible labor of those who have built the infrastructure for Silicon Valley's tech boom from the factory workers of Shenzhen to the janitors and microtask workers of the SF Bay Area, focusing on forms of labor including maintenance and care.
https://www.b4bel4b.com/halfofthesky