Film Screening and Artist Discussion

Join us as we screen the film Andra8: my favorite software is being here (2020-2021) a film by Alison Nguyen to be followed by a discussion between artist Alison Nguyen, Lukas Brasiskis, Associate Curator of Video and Film at e-flux, and Selby Nimrod, Assistant Curator at MIT List Visual Arts Center. 

Andra8: my favorite software is being here is a body of work centering on a computer-generated woman living and working in an apartment in a virtual void. Andra8 is a digital  laborer surviving on human data culled from her work as a  virtual assistant, content creator, emoji artist, and virtual trainer. Andra8 is monitored and becomes increasingly concerned with the effects of surveillance and the demands of online labor that is key to her survival. The discussion will focus on the performative aspects of the Andra8 body of work that extend into Alison Nguyen’s new video, history as hypnosis. 

We encourage you to view history of hypnosis (2023) on view in List Projects 26: Alison Nguyen in the List Center Bakalar Gallery prior to the film screening.

About the Speakers

Alison Nguyen (b. 1986), lives and works in New York. Her films have screened at e-flux, Ann Arbor Film Festival, International Film Festival Oberhausen, Edinburgh International Film Festival, Channels Festival International Biennial of Video Art, Open City Documentary Festival, the Jewish Museum, and Microscope Gallery, among others. Her work has been exhibited at institutions and galleries including Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NY; the Dowse Art Museum, New Zealand; International Studio & Curatorial Program, New York; AC Gallery, Beijing; Half Gallery, Signs and Symbols, La Kaje, Hartnett Gallery, all New York; and The University of Oklahoma; among others. Nguyen has received residencies and fellowships from the International Studio & Curatorial Program, The Institute of Electronic Arts, BRIC, Squeaky Wheel Film and Media Art Center, Signal Culture, and Vermont Studio Center. She has been awarded grants from the NYFA Artist Fellowship in Film/Video 2021, NYSCA, the Foundation for Contemporary Art, and The New York Community Trust. In 2018 Alison Nguyen was featured in Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film.” She received her BA from Brown University and is a Visual Arts MFA candidate at Columbia University.

Lukas Brasiskis is the Associate Curator of Video and Film for e-flux. He has programmed and curated a number of screening programs and exhibitions for various exhibitions for various institutions, including e-flux (New York), MoMa (New York), Anthology Film Archives (New York), National Gallery of Art (Vilnius), Alternative Film/Video Festival (Belgrade), Spectacle Theater (New York), NYU (New York), NYU Shanghai (Shanghai), West Bund Museum/Pompidou (Shanghai), Contemporary Art Center (Vilnius), Tramway Contemporary Art Center (Glasgow), Skalvija Cinema (Vilnius), etc. He received his PhD degree from New York University's Department of Cinema Studies and is an adjunct professor at NYU and CUNY/Brooklyn College since 2017.

List Projects 26: Alison Nguyen is organized by Selby Nimrod, Assistant Curator.