At the 2012 SXSW, James Bridle proposed the concept of “New Aesthetics”, referring to the rising presence of digital technology and the internet’s visual language in the physical world. The New Aesthetics Tumblr, created by Bridle, continues to feature works that incorporate pixelated graphics, machine vision, retro 8-bit form and information visualization which enhances the notion of “an eruption of the digital into the physical”. This aesthetic concept soon received criticism from Bruce Sterling, who agreed with the visual influence of digital and the internet, but suggested that “the New Aesthetic is a genuine aesthetic movement with a weak aesthetic metaphysics.”
A decade later, as technology develops, diffuses and popularizes, we look at how the digital interacts with the creators of today, and how the New Aesthetic has evolved. With a focus on AR, real-world geometries and surrealism, the exhibition will evaluate the way rendering and CGI images redefine the visual culture and shape our cognition for motion, texture, material, light path, volume etc. The exhibition will also demonstrate key events that influenced the development of this visual culture, and highlight impacts from a multidisciplinary aspect, including games, films and NFTs.
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