The cultural front line:
Digital reshaping art: Refik Anadol, the KAWS Gallery in Fortnight
BBC producer Emma Wallace and Noelle McCarathy interview Refik Anadol about the very first art gallery to debut on the digital gaming platform: Fortnight. Anadol is a Turkish, LA-based media artist who uses data and AI to create his artwork. He focuses on rethinking art spaces in all of his works, but he argues that working in a digital art gallery helps redefine the meaning of his own art. Anadol tells the interviewer that working and presenting a show in the meta-verse is the next step in digital art and NFT shows. The gallery Anadol presented at is a real and digital gallery known as the KAWS street art exhibition where art lovers are joined by virtual cartoon visitors. Anadol explains that his work is centered around using AI to visualize computer “dreams'' as he puts it. He also emphasizes that this meta-verse art show is important to expose younger generations and a larger variety of the population to high art, and art shows. Since the majority of Fortnight’s online visitors are between the ages of 14 and 22 the art community can be shared with a whole new demographic. These online players can also interact with the gallery through collecting skins that show and support the artwork.
McCarathy also takes a moment to interview some of the women involved in this meta-verse project and asks them what they would like to see changed in the digital art world. Multiple women answer the question but all come to the conclusion that there are not enough women in the digital art world, and currently the NFT “game” is dominated by men. They say women aren’t supported nearly as much as men are and do not have the same opportunities to “make it big”. They argue that there needs to be more support in the digital art world for women from both men and women. They finish off their statement by urging more women to get involved in the digital art world.
Full Podcast From BBC: