Hannah Thomas | Artists to Watch '22

Caroline Austin examines the small and poetic interactions and behaviours of human beings, including the capacity to lose, move, remember, construct, and grow, to draw attention to systems of power, particularly concerning human mobility and movement. Utilising interactive and conversational strategies and more formal research methods, she produces reciprocal artworks that include objects, installations, photography, sound, and ephemeral actions.

Caroline Austin | Artists to Watch March '22


David Vosburg is a conceptual artist living and working on Chicago's south side, exploring intersections of place, power, and meaning-making. He expresses wonder as an antidote to power: a subversive force of heightened awareness and curiosity. Wonder embraces ambiguity and imagination in order to re-narrate what is possible, building meaning deeply rooted in people and place. This orientation leads him to things otherwise overlooked, elevating and recontextualizing cast-offs in order to examine what we value and why. Neglected spaces, broken furniture, roadside trash, weeds, all bring profound potential for aesthetic insight into ourselves and the world. He has exhibited work across the United States, including Chicago, Grand Rapids, and Kansas City, as well as in London, UK.

 David Vosburg | Artists to Watch March '22

Krzysztof Pastuszka is a visual artist and creative engineer. He focuses on the complexity and tension in transition by giving voice to his experience growing up as a trans kid in the late 90s. He uses mechanisms to create a multitude of parts dependent on one another to concentrate on movement and the interplay between objects to envision the intricacies of change and the necessity of components cooperating to create transformation. He uses motion to expose all the micro-operations and mental acrobatics involved in navigating the unchanging nature of cisnormativity. His work develops a trail of survival blueprints archiving the unseen essence of his trans experience.
He received a BFA from the School of Visual Arts; graduated Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from NYC College of Technology and is a patented designer. His work has been exhibited at Elisa Contemporary Art Gallery, New York Design Center, the Affordable Art Fair, and Visual Arts Gallery in NYC.

Krzysztof Pastuszka | Artists to Watch March '22

Nana believes that constellations are the result of our purest form of creative expression. She strives to express what lies at the root of our universal impulse — the impulse that compelled our ancestors to connect the stars — by marrying the past, present and future. Calligraphy is not just a traditional cultural expression. It is a relic from the past, born from our impulse to express through “writing” — in Japanese, called “kaku.” The word “kaku (writing)” is homophonous to the words “drawing” and “scraping.” Shimomura believes that the act of “kaku” as well as music and dancing is our purest form of creativity born from our ancient impulses.

Nana Shimomura  | Artists to Watch March '22

As a multidisciplinary artist, Alex Long Yuan centres his research on humans’ living state in modern times and the relationships between humans and nature, humans and society across cultures, in a bid to find the most suitable form of expression through a variety of interdisciplinary research and artistic experiments, so as to discuss and explore in-depth how humans can best live in harmony with the blue planet and what would their rebuilt future look like if humans put their civilization as a relics in the infinite dimension of the universe. 
In accordance with the requirements of his works and projects, Alex Long Yuan often cooperate with people and organizations with different backgrounds, including scientists, ornithologists, NGOs, museum etc. Adept at the artistic expression in public spaces and inter-media creation, his work probes into multiple challenges; confronting humans and nature in the Anthropogenic age.

Alex Long Yuan | Artists to Watch March '22

Ana Rajcevic is an artist working at the intersection of sculpture and body-art, focusing on different ways of altering the body through pieces called ‘prosthetic body-sculptures’. Her artistic practice confronts the question of how the ever-shifting material forms and substances in which human subjects are embodied configure understandings of ‘humanity’ itself. By merging human and non-human parts: bodies, technologies, prosthetics and materials, Rajcevic focuses on the integration of new technologies in human bodies and lives, as well as its implications, asking: How is the corporeality of the body addressed when coupled with emerging technologies such as AI and gene-editing? And what is the future of the body as we transform into Chimeras? With a multi-disciplinary inquiry that combines experimental art with research in biomedicine, history, materials science, and psychology, Rajcevic creates ‘hybrid identities’ that challenge both bodily and disciplinary boundaries.

Ana Rajcevic | Artists to Watch February '22

James Lawton is an artist working with machine learning to create unique images and texts that illustrate how we create our digital selves, how others are able to use our data to create a form of us, as well as the veracity and distortion of those creations. He uses datasets that he has created, including self-portraits, journals, fiction, recordings, and other methods. These works address issues of identity, consciousness, self, and perception. A self-portrait method is often used to provide unrestricted, accessible, and emotionally vulnerable data based on a real person. With himself as the primary subject, he then uses that definitive data to create machine learning models whose output portrays a broad and equivocal interpretation of a person, which in turn calls into question how we create and are created by interpretations of data.

James Lawton | Artists to Watch February '22

Lucrezia explores the depth and all the crossroads generated inside a rupture that is constantly changing and deepening through nature and the earth element. Through her practice, she tries to bring on the surface pieces of what she found in the abyss with the aim and hope of creating shocking waves. Lately the artist has been deeply connected to earth and she’s trying to understand the deep relationship that keeps bringing her to everything undertaken, hidden or trapped in the geologic strata formed throughout deep time.

Lucrezia Costa | Artists to Watch February '22

Kelley Benes or Beans of John is an artist based out of Los Angeles. Beans of John has become her collection of sculptural works that are deeply inspired by nature, science, and the human body. In 2018, she started as a volunteer at the Natural History Museum—making replica plants and other replicas for dioramas, this was a breakthrough moment for her work. These practices deeply inform her artwork—in subject matter and material. Her work reflects on surrealism in nature and attempts to reuse materials that would otherwise be discarded—food waste, found objects, and hair clippings—to name a few. Most of all, Kelley’s work is rooted in humor and the absurdity of the things humans leave behind. She hopes one day her objects will be found by a future human and someone will simply laugh. Her work creates a space for laughter, discomfort and wonder, and the human element of her work serves as a reminder of our role in the natural world—we are a part of it and not onlookers.

Kelley Benes [beans of john] | Artists to Watch February '22

The core of Laas' work focuses on human relationships. He explores our fragility by weaving together contemporary mythologies that engage with aspects of persona, consumer behaviour, tribalism, and collective cultural equity in the absence of home. Trading within an economy of emotions Laas finds particular interest in the personal by exploring facets of sentimentality at an intersection between obsession and delusion. 


Alastair Laas | Artists to Watch February '22

Cecilia Bullo works primarily in sculpture and installation, encompassing different mediums and processes. Her practice is research-based and informed by historical, mythological, psychoanalytic and feminist theories, which create a vital conceptual framework for her physical work. Bullo is particularly interested in material cultures relating to rituals of healing and transformation. 
Drawing loosely on a theoretical framework, including archeologist Marija Gimbutas and her Kurgan Matrilinear hypothesis, Bullo’s current work investigates the political body of women, the return of the feminine - intended as all modes of being (her/their) - and the personification of the woman as a creatrix, fighter and destroyer. Envisaged as archeological dystopian assemblages and exploring mythological and personal narratives, these works to the artist are apotropaic sculpture-amulets and esoteric spaces, from which one can resist the repressive discriminatory framework of patriarchal culture.

Cecilia Bullo | Artists to Watch February '22

The Porcelain Series is a dialogue between the concepts of stability and instability and also the traditional and contemporary realities of life. Born from her nomadic experiences, she had experienced a yearning for stability that she has embodied within the exploration of the human form in three-dimensional spaces. Every minute of our lives is spent in physical and psychological dialogue with the space around us and the contorted bodies within these oversaturated three-dimensional spaces have been transmogrified towards semi-abstraction mimicking hard ceramic surfaces. The porcelain figurines in many older Jamaican homes seem to be ever-present and are symbolic of stability that the younger generation of Jamaicans no longer seems to be able to achieve. The contortions and attempted transformation of the bodies represent the psychological struggle. She hopes the work echoes the unease, the mental and psychological strain associated with these issues.

Monique Mogi Gilpin | Artists to Watch January '22

Practicing contemporary and conceptual photography since 2018, Kai-Yun's work is mostly about subjects such as environmental and social issues, and the question of identity. Her visual narrative is often an immersion of introspective personal quest, documentary, and mise-en-scène; characterized by a melancholic symbolism, sensitively captures and depicts human vulnerability, emotions, and yearning.

Kai-Yun Catherene Lee | Artists to Watch January '22

Socio-political, feminist artist Pritika Chowdhry’s large-scale sculptures and site-sensitive installations reference the body to memorialize difficult events. Within the frameworks of counter-memory, postmemory, and post-colonial theory, her work seeks to connect seemingly disparate geopolitical contexts. Since 2007, she has built on her oeuvre through the Partition Memorial Project. In her art, Chowdhry migrates between fibers, latex, paper, clay, glass, metal, wood, poetry, and drawing pursuing cultural references that the materials provoke. Transnational in scope, her sculptural art installations and anti-memorials bear witness to partitions of countries, civil and military wars, riots, border violence, genocides, and terrorist attacks holding space for mourning, remembrance, and repair. Chowdhry’s work has been featured in The Hindustan Times, The Indian Express, CBS, Fox News, TNS, and ABC, and exhibited widely in museums and galleries in North America, Pakistan, and India.

Pritika Chowdhry | Artists to Watch January '22

Alexandra’s cityscapes are paintings that transport you to a space. They allow you to experience different cities in a multi-faceted way. The shapes, textures, colour and geometry of the buildings, sky, water, people and vehicles create static and fluid images. Colour is key to encapsulating the energy, emotion and vibration of a place. The paintings are of densely layered forms, popping up and below one another.

Alexandra Roddan | Artists to Watch January '22

On the surface, Adi Oz-Ari’s oeuvre seems totally conceptual, but this is only one layer out of many in her works, as they carry additional autobiographical strata. A broader look at her art comes from the understanding the elements that are present. 

One element is pain, the body is the major actor in her work. Most of her references to the body are from the field of medicine and paramedical practices. She strives to expose innards and invisible, unheard pain, alongside with pieces from the body revealing vulnerability or unusual features, such as scabs and hemorrhages. In those locations, pain is mostly associated with shame and guilt, often in the context of self-harm and physical and emotional illness in rare instances. Violence is also present. Oz-Ari’s use of body imagery connects not only to pain in the medical sense but also to violence, added to which is an engagement in concepts of disruption and disturbance, anything that goes beyond the norms of the body.



Adi Oz-Ari | Artists to Watch January '22

Stories of Lewinale Havette's maternal grandmother in the Liberian village of her childhood were the first glimpse she was offered of life’s overflowing Magic. She then recognized Magic in her metamorphosis from a young girl living under a system of rigid orthodox, patriarchal ideas to the woman she is today — free and with an inclusive perspective of the world.

Lewinale Havette | Artists to Watch December '21

Yongwon designs new context and value by reviewing the cultures and twisting the conventions. He is a concept designer, aesthetic explorer, and object maker.

Yongwon  Noh | Artists to Watch December '21

Juheon Cho’s latest practice is an exploration of the memories of places, peoples and events that have been left behind. She uses Korean traditional painting techniques, installations, digital media and sculpting to bring back the evaporated senses to be captured back to our reality. 

Juheon Cho | Artists to Watch December '21

Milan Young creates work that speaks to her surroundings, thoughts, feelings, and culture within society. Her paintings are at the intersection of Abstract Expressionism, and Fauvism. Her work centers around chaos, and emotions.

Milan Young | Artists to Watch December '21

Mahsa Merci is a queer multidisciplinary artist who works in various media and techniques from painting, drawing, sculpture, to photography, installation, and video. Much of her work reflects a focus on marginal identities. From beauty to grotesque, gentleness to harshness, and feminine to masculine, Mahsa brings together a body of work that establishes new definitions of gender, identity, sexuality and redefines the meaning of beauty.

Mahsa Merci | Artists to Watch December '21

Philippe work follows the psychogeography concept by exploring the emotional impacts of our relationship with environments. Natural or urban landscapes alter our personal behavior, affect our perceptions, influence our collective interactions, and also reveal invisible connections with the non-human world (objects and animals): he translates and shape emotions, memories, and history through colors and lines in abstract compositions following a creative flow by letting go of control.

 Philippe Halaburda | Artists to Watch November '21

Many of the objects in Hidetaka Suzuki’s paintings are seemingly obvious depictions at first glance, but they are in fact detached from their original context. By doing so, they take on multiple meanings – and refuse to be pigeonholed, depriving the viewer of certainty. It blurs the boundary between what we experience as reality and what we imagine as fiction, asking us to question the truthfulness of what we see.

Hidetaka Suzuki | Artists to Watch November '21

Claudia O'Steen's work points to a never-ending process, a series of attempts to measure an infinite line, to chart the color of the sky, to capture the single point where a shift occurs in a limitless expanse. She uses sculpture as a tool for observation and perception by creating instruments and devices that capture and translate transitional moments, returning information distorted, amplified, and transformed. Using these devices, she attempts to orient herself by examining place via the lens of personal experience and primary observation, often selecting points that are ultimately impossible to calibrate against. Failure, error, and disorientation are all important means to understanding her circuitous process of discovery. Through her collaborative, research-based practice, O'Steen examines navigation, exploration, perception, and failure. She creates languages to convey distance, scale, and direction, and creates landscapes supplemented by scientific curiosity and human memory.

Claudia O'Steen | Artists to Watch November '21

Frank WANG Yefeng is an experimental animator and interdisciplinary artist based in New York, NY, and Providence, RI. He works across various media, including 3D animation, video installation, VR, sculpture, and writing. Yefeng's latest research scrutinizes the identities immersed in self-negotiation, the establishment of nomadic subjectivities, and the possibilities of conceiving new imaginations for Sinophone communities. Leaving his place of origin at a young age, the memories of moving from being a migrant to a nomad leads him to investigate the transformation of emotions and the inbetween states that occur in both virtual and physical realms. The estrangement of origin and the absence of home turn the space of "inbetweenness" into Yefeng's constant dwelling. His work embraces a poetic combined reality as a multicultural individual during this process, while various forms of stereotypes are confronted and questioned.

Frank WANG Yefeng | Artists to Watch November '21

As an interdisciplinary artist, wei works with print media, video, sound, design, and performance to render the experience of otherness. Mapping queerness and foreignness are the often topics he researches and expresses. He investigates the in-betweenness in order to trace the imprints and contextualize the present.

wei | Artists to Watch October '21

"Walking Libraries"
found / sculpted materials
[ variable dimensions | installation 

Abigail Doan’s environmental projects explore the visual intersections of site-specific landscape phenomena and art lab/design methodologies. The sculptural and organic forms populating her studio serve as an evolving archive of materials to be installed and documented in modifiable ways. These handcrafted and found objects undergo a process of categorization and selective recombination as a means to examine material life cycles, adaptability, and resilience. Abigail’s use of fiber, recycled plastics, soil/clay, and textile/tool components serve as a counterpoint to her photographic recordings of environmental stimuli and ideas about loss and preservation.

Abigail Doan | Artists to Watch October '21

"Boiler I, II"
Laser engraved glass
30 x 42 cm

Gabriel Ribeiro's practice frequently explores the possibility for dialogue between video, photography and sculpture, while embracing frictions that erupt in their articulation. Through these mediums, he has been concerned with a kind of liminal tension present in ambiguous states where meaning can be sustained, dissolved, or created anew. This speculative approach is activated by a series of devices that summon a certain obscurity from the material world, capable of producing unintelligible effects, often classified as monstrous. 

Gabriel Ribeiro | Artists to Watch October '21


"Per mezzo di stelle"
variable dimension
installation 
GianMarco Porru’s research looks into cultural narratives often constructed and transmitted via oral storytelling and manifested in popular material culture, folklore and communitarian knowledge. He asks how precise geopolitical, natural and spiritual contexts exceed organizational systems. The research he conducts on these discursive and visual archives often originates from an interest in ethnographical analyses and methodologies and later results in works that cross a range of media including performance, video, photographs and sculpture.

GianMarco Porru | Artists to Watch October '21

You’re an emerging artist with something to say — and you want to get noticed? That’s what drives us at ArtConnect. We make it our mission to showcase exceptional contemporary art by up-and-coming artists so that you can take your work to the next level. Because we believe fresh artistic voices like yours deserve a chance to be heard.

Every month we work together with 3 international curators to seek out exceptional artistic talents from around the world who will become ArtConnect Artists to Watch for 2022.

Outstanding artwork deserves to be seen by top industry experts. We believe the selection process should include many different voices, that’s why we invite an international jury of professionals from across the contemporary art field to join our jury.

This fee helps us support our curators and continue our mission to empower artists.

Add

Upgrade