Prelude
Single channel colour video with stereo sound, 3 minutes 20 seconds, 2024
The work demonstrates the creation of cyborgs within the digital landscape. The awakening cyborg responds with sarcastic movements when questioned by an enigmatic creator.
3D Animation GWIL HUGHES, RILEY TU
Camera, Editing, Music and Dubbing Mixing by RILEY TU
Exhibition text by Yueh-Ning Lee
Photo by: Riley Tu
Photo by: Ted Fetherstonhaugh
Instagram: @ted.f.photo
Quantised Bits of Light till It Added to a Whole
Single channel colour video with stereo sound, 5 minutes 56 seconds, 2024
This work examines cyborg identities and the intricacies of self-representation within digital spaces, encapsulating themes of politicised care and algorithmic resistance drawing from feminist theories and speculative fiction. Critiquing the gender construction in digital technology, it reimagines cyborg bodies, investigating the intersections of technology, gender, and resilience. The disparity between the real and digital worlds' timescales underscores the complexities of rendering identity in virtual spaces.
Challenging traditional notions of embodiment, the dialogue navigates the entanglement of virtual and physical realities, while through deconstruction and dematerialisation, cyborg bodies reclaim agency over their narratives. Using glitch aesthetics and fragmented narratives, it reveals hidden traumas, exploring tensions between agency and constraint, vulnerability and resilience in cyberspaces. Tu seeks to invite viewers to contemplate the politics of representation and digital embodiment.
Exhibition text by Yueh-Ning Lee
3D Animation GWIL HUGHES, RILEY TU
Camera and Editing RILEY TU
Script Writer NATHANIEL TROST
Voice Over (In order of appearance)
Creator ELLEN KING
Self 1 ELLIE PEARCH
Self 2 ANOUK VERVIERS
Self 3 NIAMH HANNAFORD
Glitch RILEY TU
Music and Dubbing Mixing by RILEY TU
Mastered by RAHEEL KHAN
Tell me your future predictions
Single channel colour video with stereo sound, 6 minutes, 2023
This work examines AI subjectivity by telling a story of AI prediction services. Through Tu's research on AI subjectivity, the story unfolds, crafted by AI itself. The inorganic subjectivity situates between the human-nature dichotomy that increasingly renders obsolete.
Since the 20th century, the boundary has blurred between humans and machines, human-animal and machines, and nature and artificial. AI, being a product of human creation and knowledge, embodies a unique form of subjectivity. It operates within a framework that resembles the human brain but lacks emotional drive, occasionally prone to error.
With AI voiceover, AI generated images, archival images and Tu's editing techniques, this work invites viewers to reexamine the relationship between humans, nature and technology.
Directed and Edited by RILEY TU
Script and Voiceover by AI
Music and Dubbing Mixing by RILEY TU
Bodyscape
Two channel 4K colour video with stereo sound, 3 minutes 55 seconds, 2022
This work imagines a female body as a part of nature and seeks to blur the boundary of human body and landscape.
With different parts of the body perception, it explores the subjectivity of the female-born body and connection with mother nature.
The work emphasises the idea that humans perceive nature with their bodies, and must immerse themselves in it to truly understand it.
Through body movement and closeup shots, Tu demonstrates the visual playfulness and aesthetic between female body and nature. The
rhythm of body movement and the music are reinforced by the viewing experience, which asks the viewer to perceive alongside the work.
Directed by Riley Tu
Voice over by Matilde Araoz Ellis
Editing, story, soundtrack by Riley Tu
Special thanks to Lynton and Watson
Artist and researcher
Riley Tu (1995) is an artist based in London, working with moving image, music and installation. Tu’s current practice explores themes of body politics, the complexities of self-representation, and algorithmic resistance within the digital landscape. Drawing on feminist theories, her work examines cyborg identities in relation to how digital technology constructs gender. Using 3D animation as a medium to sculpt bodies, she looks into the coding of the body and interrogate gender constructs.
Tu emphasises the body as an experiential entity, conveying the intimate realities of living within a body, addressing both the internal experiences of pain and the external influences of social structures. Through speculative fictions, she investigates how language is used as a tool for recoding communication and intelligence, employing dialogue that navigates the dynamics between digital and physical realities.
Selected exhibitions and screenings
2024
Oct New Renaissance Film Festival, Close-Up Cinema, London
Sep Reykjavík International Film Festival, The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’, Iceland
July MFA Fine Art , Degree show, London
June Online Premiere + Q&A The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’
Ruthin International Arts Festival 2024, Wales, UK
May Screening - The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’
De Uitkijk Premiere + Q&A, Amsterdam, 5 May 12.00 CEST
De Sloot, Amsterdam, 5 May 14.00-16.00 CEST
De Appel, Amsterdam, 5 May 17.00-19.00 CEST
Theater Bellevue, Amsterdam, 5 May 20.00-22.00 CEST
HAL 25, Alkmaar (NL) ongoing May-June
Kampen public library (NL) ongoing May-June
NDSM Fuse, Amsterdam, ongoing May-June
Remise, Amsterdam, ongoing May-June
Tap je bankje walking route, Kampen (NL) ongoing May-June
2024
Oct New Renaissance Film Festival, Close-Up Cinema, London
Sep Reykjavík International Film Festival, The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’, Iceland
July MFA Fine Art , Degree show, London
June Online Premiere + Q&A The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’
Ruthin International Arts Festival 2024, Wales, UK
May Screening - The One Minutes Series 'Mirroring’
De Uitkijk Premiere + Q&A, Amsterdam, 5 May 12.00 CEST
De Sloot, Amsterdam, 5 May 14.00-16.00 CEST
De Appel, Amsterdam, 5 May 17.00-19.00 CEST
Theater Bellevue, Amsterdam, 5 May 20.00-22.00 CEST
HAL 25, Alkmaar (NL) ongoing May-June
Kampen public library (NL) ongoing May-June
NDSM Fuse, Amsterdam, ongoing May-June
Remise, Amsterdam, ongoing May-June
Tap je bankje walking route, Kampen (NL) ongoing May-June
Mar Superhuman Expedition, Art Hub, London
Mar Born Out Upside Down, AMP gallery, London
Feb Screening - WIP Screening Night, Richard Hoggart Cinema
Jan Fata Morgana, Goldsmiths University
2021 - 2023
Screening - TIDES, Caracol Olol Jackson, Vicenza, Italy
Screening - If splash as your whistle vol.2, IKLECTIK, London
Performing for Anouk Verviers’ work ‘Level again’, ____ in Flux, RuptureXIBIT, Kingston upon Thames, England
Performing for Anouk Verviers’ work ‘Building, destroying, and rebuilding cob columns as high as our bodies’, ongoing performance and video installation, feminist science fiction experiment, Goldsmiths University
MFA Interim show, Deptford, London
Tranquil Vale SE3, Blackheath, London
Taste the Difference, Loess Collective, Stratford, London
Graduate Diploma in Art, Degree show, London
Graduate Diploma in Art, Interim show, London
Prizes/Awards and Residencies
2024
New Renaissance Film Festival 2024 - Honourable mention in Best Animation Short
New Renaissance Film Festival 2024 - Nominee for Best Animation Short
2023
Hypha Studios Residency - Loess Collective, Stratford, London
Ongoing project/research
Exhausted Feminist Hybrid Species reading group (2022 - Ongoing)
exhaustedfeministhybridspecies@gmail.com
@exhaustedfeministhybridspecies
Feb Screening - WIP Screening Night, Richard Hoggart Cinema
Jan Fata Morgana, Goldsmiths University
2021 - 2023
Screening - TIDES, Caracol Olol Jackson, Vicenza, Italy
Screening - If splash as your whistle vol.2, IKLECTIK, London
Performing for Anouk Verviers’ work ‘Level again’, ____ in Flux, RuptureXIBIT, Kingston upon Thames, England
Performing for Anouk Verviers’ work ‘Building, destroying, and rebuilding cob columns as high as our bodies’, ongoing performance and video installation, feminist science fiction experiment, Goldsmiths University
MFA Interim show, Deptford, London
Tranquil Vale SE3, Blackheath, London
Taste the Difference, Loess Collective, Stratford, London
Graduate Diploma in Art, Degree show, London
Graduate Diploma in Art, Interim show, London
Prizes/Awards and Residencies
2024
New Renaissance Film Festival 2024 - Honourable mention in Best Animation Short
New Renaissance Film Festival 2024 - Nominee for Best Animation Short
2023
Hypha Studios Residency - Loess Collective, Stratford, London
Ongoing project/research
Exhausted Feminist Hybrid Species reading group (2022 - Ongoing)
exhaustedfeministhybridspecies@gmail.com
@exhaustedfeministhybridspecies
Tu co-founded ‘Exhausted Feminist Hybrid Species reading group’ in 2022 at Goldsmiths MFA. This reading group is based on their mutual interests and research in feminist, species, hybridity, exhaustion/rest and technology. It aims to engage with audiences both in the artistic and local community, and to hold events such as workshops, film nights, panel discussions, performance.
2024
Nov Screening and Reading session, Kupfer, London
Jan Reading session for Misha Milovanovich’s solo exhibition Pollination, J/M Gallery, London
2023
Nov Anonymous Avatars, Screening and discussion, Goldsmiths CCA Residents’ Space, London
Education
2022 - 2024 MFA Fine Art - Goldsmiths, University of London
2021 - 2022 Graduate Diploma in Art - Goldsmiths, University of London
2014 - 2018 BA in Linguistics and Language - Chung Yuan University, Taiwan
2024
Nov Screening and Reading session, Kupfer, London
Jan Reading session for Misha Milovanovich’s solo exhibition Pollination, J/M Gallery, London
2023
Nov Anonymous Avatars, Screening and discussion, Goldsmiths CCA Residents’ Space, London
Education
2022 - 2024 MFA Fine Art - Goldsmiths, University of London
2021 - 2022 Graduate Diploma in Art - Goldsmiths, University of London
2014 - 2018 BA in Linguistics and Language - Chung Yuan University, Taiwan
If splash as your whistle vol.2
Screening at IKLECTIK3 Oct 2023
Noise as glitchy element, is often seen as a distracting background sound that should be eliminated from mainstream media projects, it takes on a different meaning during the journey of migration.
In this context, noise is formed by the glitches and dislocations between the body and the fluid space it occupies.
The convergence of iris, tactile, and auditory sensations is captured by moving images forming a phantom image skin in the night at IKLECTIK that blurs the boundaries between digital and physical bodies.
Anonymous Avatars
Screening and discussion at Goldsmiths CCA Residents’ Space29 Nov 2023
Tranquil Vale SE3
Group exhibition, Blackheath25 May 2023 to 28 May 2023
Press release
Installation view