Agnes Momirski is an interdisciplinary artist, visual director, writer and performer, based in Rotterdam and Ljubljana. Her work and research explores the human condition within the global technological context, especially in the realms of digital culture, the Metaverse, hacking culture, social media, and pop culture.
Through a post-humanist lens, her work departs from a deeply embodied practice rooted in voice and language, seeking the links between nature, the posthuman, embodiment, rhythm, inner work and healing, creating multimedia visual, music and sound collaborations across disciplines.
Agnes creates educational courses, visual content, research articles, pop music, and sound performances.
In 2019, she co-founded Specter, a research umbrella for interdisciplinary events and artist collaborations, together with Georgia Kareola.
Her performance siXren (Verbum medicinae) has been performed on more than 20 occasions internationally.
Her work has recently been shown at Momus Thessaloniki 2023, Worm Rotterdam, Kanaal 40 Amsterdam 2023, Impakt Utrecht 2021; MGLC Ljubljana 2020; Roodkapje Rotterdam; Singularity now at EDAF 2018; The Wrong 2017; Kiblix 2017; Prospects and Concepts, Art Rotterdam 2018; Tent Rotterdam, De Pont Museum, Museo Alicante, and others.
She won the Liquid award by Motel Mozaique 2019, was a recipient of Young talent award by Mondriaan funds in 2016, Squeeze online award 2016, and in June 2017 she was nominated for Tesla award by Mota Museum.
E-MAIL: agnes.momirski@gmail.com
Stemming from the embodied perspective, I examine sense perception and participation through language, voice, speech, and storytelling. My works are shaped by performative approaches using voice, body and music, spoken word and immersive elements such as scent and light, and accessible technological tools.
Technological progress is seeing the complexification of human relationships and communication, and the break down of separation between organic and inorganic, human and nonhuman, animate and inanimate, temporal and eternal. Human nature is at crossroads, and we’ve come to seek models of transformation, at every level: molecular, biological, personal, cultural, spiritual.
Meditating on the transitional nature of human nature and human experience in the posthuman world, my spoken word performances, rituals, readings and musical experiences, explore the effects of storytelling and language, over a spectrum of music and performative genres. I am interested in the crossovers between healing storytelling and popular and urban music, and the contemporary deconstructed music experiences. For human consciousness is deeply affected by language and sound, and language is deeply woven into our perceptual participation with the world around us. New insights into the nature of consciousness return us to the poetic metaphors of traditional cultures or arcane traditions, to ceremonial and transcendent sensual living. Continuously more aware of our liminal nature in symbiotic relationship with technologies, we seek for new models of self to find new participation in the collective unconscious.
The posthuman subject is the “transitional human”: “someone who by virtue of their technology usage, cultural values and lifestyle constitutes an evolutionary link to the coming era of posthumanity.” I like to believe that as humans we’re becoming supernatural, enhancing, re-engineering ourselves, and in order to do so, we have to revive to the alchemical world view* or the more-than-human knowledge of the earth to sustain a humanity in the future. Hence, I believe that inner work and arcane traditions have a large role in the process of reengineering of humanity in the future, towards overcoming our genetic destinies and cultural conditioning.
Within the context of human progress, my interests span from human optimization, care politics, wellbeing, mindfulness commodification, to how the virtual embodiment increasingly influences our earthly soul experiences. I use accessible digital tools such as Instagram, and AR, 3D, to explore new soul and perceptual experiences in digital space. The merging of our spiritual and digital (and other) selves, are new configurations of posthuman subjectivity, redefining our participation in the world and breaking down the Cartesian construct of what a human is.
(*Morris Berman, The re-enchantment of the world)
Agnes Momirski
Currently living in Rotterdam, NL
Born in Ljubljana (Slovenia)
Education
2012-2014 Royal College of Art, Sculpture MA, London, UK
2011 (Autumn term) Chelsea College of Art and Design, London, UK
2008/2012 Willem de Kooning Academy, Rotterdam, NL
2007/2008 Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Ljubljana, SLO
Solo Exhibitions & Projects
2022 .04 Chrome Code, online audio-visual journey
2022 .06 MetaTrixx, research project
2020 .08 Polymorphic ritual, Cirkulacija 2, Ljubljana
2020 .02 siXren, MGLC Svicarija, Ljubljana
2018 .04 DIGITAL DAWN, LUMINOUS VOICES, Roodkapje Rotterdam
2017 .11 VALA (part1&2), KIBLA, Maribor (Kiblix festival for intermedia art)
2017 .06 VALA (part 1), Kino Siska, Center for urban culture, Ljubljana
2016 .04 Clairvoyant humans, Tower of intermedia art, Kranj, Slovenia
2015 .09 OBVSNSS, UAUU Gallery, Ljubljana
2015 .03 Affinit, Poligon, Ljubljana
2013 .06 Communication device, De Pont Museum, Tilburg
Group Exhibitions
2022 .12 Now talks, Maaspodium Rotterdam, Curated by Peerke and Music Matters
2022 .06 Lente Kabinet, Metatrixx live performance
2021 .09 Weird Gnosis, Impakt online exhibition
2021 .08 AXS art, Amsterdam
2021 .07 HOR, music performance
2021 .01 Preserving machine, Digital Artist residency x Implied gallery, online exhibition
2020 .12 Physical intimacy, online exibition
2020 .07 ADAF 2020, Technotribalism, Athens digital arts festival
2020 .06 Virtual Cocoons, Specter
2020 .06 Time Framed #5, Mono Rotterdam, siXren performance, curated by Leonie Gores
2020 .09 Festival Racka, Galerija sodobne umetnosti Celje
2019 .11 IMPAKT festival, VALA screening
2019 .09 The children of the space - Libra season guided meditation, curated by Anastasia Loginova, Today's Art festival
2019 .06 SPECTER, V2_Lab for unstable media, VALA screening
2019 .05 Wellness and Oppression, VALA screening, New York, curated by Kara Rooney and Eva Davidova
2019 .05 Trans-cosmic ritual, Extrapool Nijmegen, curated by Danielle Lemaire
2019 . 04 Libra full moon, Motel Mozaique festival 2019, performance ritual
2019 .02 Vala screening, Borgerstraat studios, ART Rotterdam weekend
2018 .11 KONTRA festival, Performance ritual, with Nala Brown, Rotterdam
2018 .10 The circuit of overthinking - the circus of it girls; by Mette Sterre; Kunstverein Hamburg, Germany
2018 .09 Reunion exhibition, Kunstpodium T, Tilburg
2018 .06 RED PACK, Roodkapje Rotterdam
2018 .06 Chains of consumption, curated by Milica Jovicevic and MINT Art
2018 .05 SINGULARITY NOW, Athens digital arts festival
2018 .02 Deep Trash Romance, Cuntemporary, London
2018 .02 Prospects and Concepts, Mondriaan fonds, ART ROTTERDAM 2018
2017 .11 The quickest path via, The Wrong, Digital art Biennale
2017 .09 Arte Concordia, Rotterdam (curated by Karin Arink)
2017 .02 Borgerstraat open studios, video screening & Artist talk
2016 .12 Radar, Cirkulacija 2, Ljubljana
2016 .11 Winterwolven V, Arminius, Roodkapje, Rotterdam
2016 .10 Digital Big Screen, International video art festival, Trbovlje
2016 .04 RCA Secret, London and Dubai
2015 .11 The Others Art Fair, Turin, Italy
2015 .07 Contemporary fashion illustration, ShowStudio Gallery, London
2015 .07 Two hundred acres, Pump House Gallery, London
2015 .07 Fluorescent, Soho Arts Festival, London
2015 .04 EAC 2015, Museo de la universidad de Alicante, Spain
2014 .09 Fluorescent, Soho Arts Festival, London
2014 .06 SHOW RCA 2014, Battersea, London
2014 .06 CKOM, Ram foundation Gallery, Rotterdam
2014 .03 RCA Secret, Dyson building, London
2013 .11 SHOWcabinet Maison Martin Margiela, SHOWstudio Gallery, London
2013 .09 Inf. Ins., Leeszaal Rotterdam West
2013 .03 RCA Secret, Dyson building, London
2013 .02 WIP show, Kensington, RCA Interim Exhibition, London
2012 .11 Middle land, RCA drawing exhibition, Birmingham
2012 .06 WDKA Graduation show, Fenixloodsen Rotterdam
2012 .05 Inside the house, Kunstpodium T Gallery, Tilburg
2012 .05 All you have is your body, Kunstinzight Rotterdam
2012 .03 Goethe-Institut, Rotterdam
2012 .02 Film/Video/Sound Event, Picture-This, Bristol
2010 .10 Perfect strangers, Tent Rotterdam
Publications
2017. 11 Shelters of babylon, Kiblix festival 2017, Maribor
2017 .10 The quickest via pavilion, The wrong
2017 .11 Vala, artist publication, Rotterdam
2015 .07 Two hundred acres, exhibition catalogue, London
2015 .04 EAC 2015, exhibition catalogue, Spain
2014 .06 Royal College of Art, Sculpture 2014, London
2013 .11 Grote Rotterdamse Kunstkalender 2014, Rotterdam
2013 .07 5 Jaar Leerling/Meester project in De Pont, Tilburg
2013 .04 Leerling/meester exhibitions 2012, Tilburg
2012 .06 Repeat+Unreal=Reality, thesis publication
2012 .05 Inside the house, artist publication accompanying the exhibition
2007 .05 Ruins of the essence, book of poetry, published by Gimnazija Vic
Writing & Curatorial work
Magazine columns:
2018 - ongoing - New Edge Magazine (SLO/UK)
Bi-yearly printed column on arts&technology
(in English)
2016 - 2019 - Moje zdravje (SLO) - Health magazine
Monthly column on arts, digital tech, and health
(in Slovenian)
Curating initiatives:
2019 - Specter - umbrella for curatorial initiatives, with Georgia Kareola
2017 - Round table conversation at Kiblix festival 2017, Ljubljana (SLO) -
Digital princesses and cyborg princes - initiated by Agnes Momirski,
with Dunja Kukovec, Ida Hirsenfelder, Olja Grubic, Puck Schot.
2017- ongoing Video program curator at IGNOR festival, monthly art and literary events in Ljubljana, Slovenia
Teaching
2021 - Willem de Kooning Academie, kerndocent / senior tutor - Autonomous practice
Artist talks & lectures
MetaModern, May 2022, curated by Thom Hammer
Fold London, Bio-Hacking with Language, August 2020
MGLC Svicarija, January 2020, curated by Miha Colner
Architectural Intelligence and Multiple Ecologies - Lecture by prof. Thomas Mical, University of Silesia in Katowice, Faculty of Humanities, Institute of Culture Studies, Poland - discourse with Takaharu Tezuka, Agnes Momirski, curated by dr Małgorzata Kądziela/PhD, December 2020 link here
Specter, sharing circle dialogue, V2_ Lab for Unstable media, Rotterdam 2019
Kontra podcast, artist interview, November 2018
Day of the young artist, curated by Youri Appelo, De Pont Museum, 24.9.2018
Artist talk, Anxious city festival, Rotterdam Art And Radio, 2.9.2018
Vala, artist talk, Prospects and Concepts, Art Rotterdam, 9.2.2018
Vala, artist talk and exhibition finissage, Maribor, 8.12.2017
Conversas, Rotterdam 2017
Awards
2021 Droom & Daad grant - Chrome Code project
2021 CBK Rotterdam, O&O grant, MetaTrixx project
2019 Liquid award, Libra Full Moon performance ritual, Motel Mozaique 2019
2017 (nomination) Tesla award, among 5 nominees for an interdisciplinary artist, Mota Museum, SLO
2016 Squeeze award online 2016, Trieste Contemporanea, Trieste, Italy
2016 Werkbijdrage Jong talent, Mondriaan fonds, The Netherlands
2015 (Special mention) Autofocus 7 Art Competition and film screening at The Others Art Fair, Tourin, IT
2013-14 Prins Bernhard Scolarship, Cultuurfonds, The Netherlands
2012-14 Grant for studying abroad, Ministry of Culture, Slovenia
2011-12 Huygens grant for international students, NUFFIC, The Netherlands
2009-12 Grant for studying abroad, City Hall of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Residencies
2020 .01 - .02 Svicarija residency, Ljubljana, Slovenija
2018 .08 Digital artist residency, curated by Tom Miles
Commissions
2017 Dateagleart, Commissioned video art work, December 2017
2017 Sontag Shogun, music video, Young Bloods