ANDREI RIABOVITCHEV
I AM NOT DEAD (2024)
53’’
I Am Not Dead features a striking visual concept where female faces are fused with golden skulls. This juxtaposition creates a powerful commentary on mortality and identity, blending beauty with the macabre. The golden skulls may symbolize wealth, vanity, or the transient nature of life, while the female faces represent vitality and the human experience. The overall aesthetic likely combines elements of surrealism and artistic expression, inviting viewers to ponder the relationship between life and death, beauty and decay. The use of gold adds a touch of opulence, enhancing the visual impact and emotional depth of the piece.
(additional 3D editing by Ivan Weightman)
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Cat Girl and Cat Girl blue gold
(2024)
24’’ e 38’’
"Cat Girl" presents a captivating and unsettling character that embodies the duality of beauty and terror. This half-female, half-cat face is not fully formed, which adds to the hypnotic quality of the visuals. The design may feature feline elements such as ears, whiskers, or fur, combined with human traits, creating a surreal and otherworldly appearance.
The character's movements and expressions might evoke a sense of allure, drawing viewers in with their beauty, while simultaneously instilling a feeling of unease or disturbance. The contrast between the graceful, enchanting aspects of femininity and the primal, instinctual nature of a cat creates a complex emotional response. The overall atmosphere of the video likely blends elements of fantasy and horror, making "Cat Girl" an intriguing exploration of identity and the boundaries between human and animal.
BIO
Andrei Riabovitchev is a UK-based artist currently working in the film and animation industry.
As a senior concept artist, he has contributed to films such as Aladdin, Barbie, Wrath of the Titans, X-Men: First Class, Wolfman, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Parts 1 & 2.
His creative process begins with envisioning his ideas. Using AI, he employs algorithms to generate inspiring concepts or refine his thoughts, blending digital elements and experimenting with textures, colors, and composition.
ClownVamp
JUNK #157
(2024)
From the Schmrypto Collection
What happens when advertising is corrupted by AI? In THE JUNK MACHINE, ClownVamp explores how open-source AI models are infesting marketing technology, amplifying the biases of the past into the very futuristic present. To explore this, he built a very pink physical robot (The Junk Machine) with an embedded NVIDIA Jetson robotics computer and a locally stored version of SDXL Turbo (a lightweight AI model).
Upon pushing a big red button, the machine generates in real-time a piece of AI Junk Mail and prints it out at 6" x 6" using an onboard dye sublimation printer. For THE JUNK MACHINE Curated, ClownVamp selected 222 outputs from the machine that best represented the intention of the work, upscaled them to 12K resolution, and color-graded them. These 1980s callbacks, sloppy and drenched in hot pink, show the biases and patterns rife in AI. Without demographic prompting, the models are consistently white, most likely blond if female, and at the ripe marketing age of 25 to 35. Between floating limbs and extra fingers, these advertisements for vice, gluttony, and over-consumption show how creative AI's insertion into advertising both reflects and fuels a dark and pernicious force in our visual language—hardening the biases of the past into the visual clutter of the future.
BIO
ClownVamp is a conceptual artist who uses a combination of narrative techniques and AI to examine the socially constructed nature of our reality.
His work has been exhibited in New York, Paris, and Los Angeles. Their solo exhibition, “Chester Charles: The Lost Grand Master”, premiered in New York City in 2023. ClownVamp’s work has been featured and published in Artnet, Outland, Surface Magazine, RightClick Save, and more.
An avid collector of AI art and a member of the MAIF art collective, he lives in New York City with their partner and their very silly 10-year-old corgi.
Katie Morris
TO THE HEAVENS
(2023)
A visual exploration of humanity's enduring search for meaning and the sacred, particularly in the face of mortal peril. The artwork traverses a commentary on the dichotomy between earthly existence, with its trials and tribulations, and the human yearning for significance and transcendence. The piece becomes a figurative ascent, a physical expression of an internal and existential journey towards nirvana
DREAM CYCLE 01
(2023)
Perception is but a fragment of reality.
FRAGMENTS OF THE DIGITAL SELF
(2023)
“Fragments of the Digital Self” sets forth an important visual commentary on the impact of the digital revolution on our personal identity, privacy, and the human condition. The work resonates deeply with the digital age and its pervasive influence on contemporary life.
BIO
Katie Morris (b. 2000) is a contemporary artist born and based in Scotland. She is inspired by the relentless evolution of technology that has defined her era. Her work sparks a sense of curiosity surrounding the relationship between humanity and the machines we create. Through her work, viewers are prompted to reflect on the nature of reality in an age of artificial constructs. Her practice involves human-machine collaboration to. explore and redefine the role of art in a technology-driven world. Katie Morris' work amalgamates traditional artistic ideologies with AI processes, creating a fusion that challenges conventional perspectives. Katie Morris holds an honours degree in Fine Art from DJCAD. She has received the Society of Scottish Artists New Graduate Award.
UIVO 14
UIVO is an annual cultural event promoted by the Maia City Council, dedicated to illustration. It celebrates and promotes the work of national and international illustrators and visual artists, providing a platform for showcasing illustration in various styles and formats and encouraging critical thinking about contemporary illustration.
IMAGES and PATHOLOGIES (?) is this year’s theme, exploring the condition of contemporary imagery through categories such as analog illustration (questioning the need to return to or remain in this medium) and contrasting it with digital imagery, technological manipulation, the growing use of artificial intelligence for image creation, and the recurrent use of filters and digital tools to generate the “perfect image.” On a more metaphorical level, the exhibition also addresses visual representations that explore or reflect disturbing, dysfunctional, or utopian aspects of the human condition.
The extension of the exhibition at Galeria 9:16 features works by artists Andrei Riabovitchev, Katie Morris, and ClownVamp, who use artificial intelligence as a medium for their material and conceptual expression. This partnership between Maia’s Illustration Showcase and Canal 180 represents this year’s dissemination strategy, presenting illustration as “A HOWL THAT CONTAGIATES.”
9:16
9:16 is a vertical, digital gallery displaying 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, right here in our space in Bombarda. Throughout 2024, we will be showcasing the work of various artists from various disciplines of video and digital art and finally bringing media arts to one of the most creatively dynamic neighbourhoods in Porto.
