Hi, my name is Virginie Tan and I'm an artist and designer.

About

Instagram

✨✨✨✨✨✨About me✨✨✨✨✨✨
Emotional Interfaces' online exhibition
Virginie Tan (b. 1992, Saint-Denis) is a French of Sino-Cambodian descent artist and designer based in London. She works across the physical and the virtual, with elements of interactivity, video, sound and poetry. 💫
Her practice is anchored within the dynamics of technology and society, between the technological sublime and the daze it puts us through. There is a certain absurdity that runs throughout her works, highlighting the functional and dysfunctional of technology’s usage. This is translated by interactive installations and videos, hijacking the known codes of digital interfaces.
👀 For any queries, contact at oy[at]virginietan.com

Shows

2023, Lawless Imagination – RuptureXIBIT (London, UK)
2023, Imaginarium – The Artist Workspace Gallery (Virtual Gallery)
2022, WIP 22 Art and Technology Festival - CYENS (Nicosia, Cyprus)
2022, Un/Sense - NEXT at Christie's (London, UK)
2021, DOOMSCROLL - Leonardo Pavilion at The Wrong Biennale (Online)
2021, Boredom Is Not A Luxury – Craft Central (London, UK)
2021, Non Native Native (Online)
2018, AKT (Kyiv, Ukraine)
2017, Alter_Action (IDC 16_17 Grad Show) at UAL - London College of Communication (London)
2017, Homoethesis Lab at The Wrong Biennale (Online)
2017, Ars Electronica Festival at Post-City (Linz)
2017, Digital Making Art School at Tate Modern (London)
2016, ICART Media Festival at ICART (Paris)
2015, Transient Festival at Espace Pierre Cardin (Paris)
2014, Avant Première at HEAR (Strasbourg)

Residencies

2022, Discovery Residency Fondation Culture & Diversité - Villa Noailles (Hyères, France)
2021, Discovery Residency Fondation Culture & Diversité - Villa Medicis (Rome, Italy)
2019, EUCIDA at RUA RED (Dublin, Ireland)

Curation

2020, Emotional Interfaces x UNCERTAINTY-19 at EP7 (Paris)
2020, Emotional Interfaces / The Wrong Biennale / Closing Party at La Machine du Moulin Rouge (Paris)
2019, Emotional Interfaces for The Wrong Biennale (Online)

Talks

2022, Christie’s Education Lecture | Cutting Edge Contemporary Art (London, UK)
2021, Webinar Curating on the Web by Curating.Online (Online)
2019, Guest Lecture for the 3rd year BA Creative Digital Media at TU Delt (Dublin, Ireland)
2019, Guest Lecture for the 4th year BA Creative Digital Media at TU Delt (Dublin, Ireland)
2018, Emerging Talents Program at Atelier Clerici (Milan, Italy)

Education

2017, MA Interaction Design Communication at UAL – London College of Communication
2016, MA Research in Visual Arts at University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
2014, BA Graphic Communication at HEAR – Arts Décoratifs of Strasbourg

© 2024 Virginie Tan. This website uses W3.CSS, Animate.css, Spheres.

Works

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refresh 2022
Interactive installation
refresh is an audio-visual interactive installation exploring how the Internet’s gestural experience have shaped the ways we behave and consume.
We trade our time, attention and data for simplicity and convenience, while powering up exploitative and damaging business models. refresh is displayed as a speculative wellbeing station to heal from this understanding – a break from endless consumption through a meditative session, unlocked by the pull-to-refresh gesture.
Picture of refresh
This is activated by a LeapMotion sensor which can track hand movement, that has to be moving up and down to "refresh" the installation. However, the wellbeing content displayed appears to reproduce familiar patterns to keep us hooked, as the gesture become more and more entrancing. Yet, it’s the only way to soothe ourselves down and find rationality.
Screenpoetry - i got your mail2022
Video
Picture of Screenpoetry - i got your mail
SCREENPOETRY – i got your mail is part of the series SCREENPOETRY, an invitation to revisit screensavers, intersecting poetry and digital art, encouraging the audience to let the screen be a still place again – a break from the constant feed and streaming.
The vertical format is a reminder to Instagram reels, in which all content are constantly looped, highlighting a never-ending comsuption of content. This instance of SCREENPOETRY explores the digital weight in personal relationships.
Screenpoetry - is time 9 to 52022
Video
Picture of Screenpoetry - is time 9 to 5
SCREENPOETRY – is time 9 to 5 is part of the series SCREENPOETRY, an invitation to revisit screensavers, intersecting poetry and digital art, encouraging the audience to let the screen be a still place again – a break from the constant feed and streaming.
The vertical format is a reminder to Instagram reels, in which all content are constantly looped, highlighting the never-ending consumption of content. This instance of SCREENPOETRY explores topics such as work labour, time passing and sense-making.
Screenpoetry - nowhere to go 2021
Website – screenpoetry.net
SCREENPOETRY – nowhere to go is the first artwork that started the series SCREENPOETRY, an invitation to revisit screensavers, intersecting poetry and digital art, encouraging the audience to let the screen be a still place again – a break from the constant feed and streaming.
Picture of Screenpoetry
It was first inspired by the state of lockdown and the never-ending usage of screens, and the nostalgia evoked by screensavers usage in the 2000s. The original website format allow the work to be available anywhere and can be a substitute to an actual screensaver.
do not wash at (silence)ºC2021
Textiles
Picture of do not wash at (silence)ºC
A project part of the Non Native Native Fair, an online festival which intends to reclaim Asian cultural narratives in the European landscape.
Picture of do not wash at (silence)ºC
This is a poetry project highlighting the ongoing Asian hate crimes, by putting the wearer in the position of the silencer – symbolising the invisibility and the hidden struggles that aren’t being acknowledged. Rendering the invisible, visible, through a consumable form – a t-shirt, and a tote bag – affordable and easy to wear, like a culture that keeps getting consumed without second thoughts.
Picture of do not wash at (silence)ºC
Both items have an inside-out effect – meaning the clothing appears a certain way, but when reversed, it reveals another side of the story. The front side represents a monolith culture that is used for props, while the inside reveals poetry fuelled by personal ruminations around identity and racism. The label also features a QR code leading to an Instagram filter, with another text to discover.
Picture of do not wash at (silence)ºC

How to - surf with a mouse 2017
Interactive installation
Picture of HOW TO - SURF WITH A MOUSE's installation
HOW TO - SURF WITH A MOUSE was first presented at the LCC Graduate Show, and is part of my final year thesis titled "The Cyberflâneur — A Reflexion On Web Surfing". The work here aims to reveal the uncertainty behind web surfing by materialising the mechanical mouse’s actions into tangible objects, through an interactive installation using bits of Arduino, MAX/MSP and web programming.
These exaggerated objects covered in black to symbolise the desire we seek in the glossy screen, while drawing the ambiguity between their anti-affordance and the context they are being re-used for. The physicality they add contrasts with the flatness of the screen and its gestural limitations. We have to physically scroll, click, and move around these over-sized components.
But, the question is – do we still actually (web-)surf? The genuine exploratory use of the Internet has been overshadowed by the never-ending feed and its algorithmic takeover. This project aims to layout the absurdity yet still exploratory aspect of digital culture, and its relationship with the addictiveness yet physicality of the gestures used.

Do it right, do it slow 2017
Interactive installation
Picture of DO IT RIGHT, DO IT SLOW's installation
This project has first been produced during my MA IDC year through a neo-tribe research around the Slow Movement. You can find the entire making journey on my blog. It has then been exhibited at Ars Electronica Festival 2017. The installation uses of bits of Arduino and MAX/MSP.
Striving against the rise of the high-speed society, the Slow Movement's motto isn’t about doing everything at a snail’s pace, but doing everything as the right speed. The aim of DO IT RIGHT, DO IT SLOW is to make the audience understand that motto through a meditative musical experience.
Still, what is the point of bringing technology to an experience doable without such means? I would say to reflect: I’m re-thinking the scroll gesture, daily used to navigate through the endless feeds of social medias. Instead of that digital output, here is an invitation to learn how to slow down by scrolling down at the right speed, and board into an intimate musical journey.

You have to face me 2016
Interactive installation
Picture of YOU HAVE TO FACE ME's installation
I first produced YOU HAVE TO FACE ME for the ICART Media Festival – now named Les Chambres Numériques. The installation is made of 23 computers where a program is running using Processing and SuperCollider.
Picture of YOU HAVE TO FACE ME's installation
The interactive protocol is simple: the spectator have to face the computer to listen to its speaking. If he/she looked away, the monologue immediately stops. Every computer has its own sentence to speak – you can hear some of them here. These voices have a recognizable computer-ish tone, yet they contrast with an hint of realism. It was a way to personify the computers, almost as if they could finally voice their thoughts.
Picture of YOU HAVE TO FACE ME's installation
This artwork marks the era we are in today: A.I is growing tremendously, but still shows its limits. The contrast heard is a way to portray those limits, with the computer’s voices almost sounding like they are struggling to speak in a normal way, and truly gain their supposed autonomy. My aim was to create an immersive yet soothing experience, where the spectator had to take his/her time to engage with the unknown.

From 1 to 10 seconds 2015
Videos
Picture of FROM 1 TO T0 SECONDS' installation
FROM 1 TO 10 SECONDS is a series of videos first exhibited at Transient Festival in 2015, then at the Wrong Biennale in 2017. During the first event, both artworks popped up like spams among the others videos for 10 short seconds every moment or so. By that particular display, I wanted the spectator to grasp its ephemeral nature.
The glitches were the result of a defective smartphone and the app Snapchat − hence the title is a direct reference to the limited time of its content. The images I took with the app − landscapes such as the forest, the river and the sea, became the testament of the ephemeral nature of digital memory.

Curation

Emotional Interfaces 2019-2020
Online/offline exhibitions Website
Emotional Interfaces' online exhibition
Since 2019, I'm co-curating Emotional Interfaces. This project have first been part of the Wrong Biennale 2019-2020. The online exhibition is still available here. We also organized the closing party at La Machine du Moulin Rouge / Bar à Bulles in Paris, France.
Picture of Emotional Interfaces' offline exhibition
Since then, Emotional Interfaces fully became an explorative and curatorial space in which we discuss the following — how digital interfaces have been shaping emotional behaviours? We invite artists and designers to reflect on the theme, organizing online and offline exhibitions, as well as hosting Instagram residencies.
Picture of Emotional Interfaces' offline exhibition
Thanks to my friend and collaborator Astrid Lours-Riou, and all the artists who were involved until now: Pipe Amatayakul, Harmonie Aupetit, Sandra Araújo, Emma Cozzani, Francis Kussatz, Kyo Kim, Adrien Jou, Stefanie Luchtenberg, Elie Meignan, Daniel Pinheiro, Quinn Scargill, Vincent Tanguy, Mathieu Tremblin, Roman Trilo, Adam Tuch, Charlie Tweed, Filipe Vilas-Boas, Betty Zhang

Collabs

curious matter :: act I — openness 2018
Interactive installation
Picture of CURIOUS MATTER' installation
In the context of Curious Matter’s temporary art collective project, I was in charge of producing motion videos for an interactive installation using bits of Arduino and web programming. You can find more informations here.
Collaborators:
Roman Trilo (UA) — Creative Direction
Kien Fam Chung (UA/VN) — Conception, Management
Virginie Tan (FR) — Conception, Motion Design
Oleksii Kryvoruchko (UA) — Sound Design, Assistance
Yaroslav Stasyuk (UA) — Programming
Eugene Mikitka (UA) — Video Production
Dmytro Kyrylovets (UA) — Video Production

Space Intimacy 2017
Installation
SPACE INTIMACY is an interactive installation produced within the Digital Maker Collective, and was part of the Tate Exchange Programme at Tate Modern. The installation was openly displayed – using a heart rate and GSR sensors sending datas to a MAX/MSP patch, both feedbacking to a dome mapping projection. You can see the full WIP there.
We started this project from one concept: that is of the borders. Despite the fact that the Internet has challenged the significance of borders, it doesn't mean that we are being automatically more open-minded although we are more connected – wouldn't that be because of our own personal borders? SPACE INTIMACY wants to challenge the notion of these personal borders, via a peer-to-peer installation.
The spectator A enters a dome filled of visuals from the data of the spectator B, litteraly witnessing his/her intimacy. By tweaking that contrast and transforming it into an intimate experience using body sensors – each sensor affected the visuals in different ways; this is also an open invitation to use datas differently to craft meaningful experiences.
Collaborators:
Pipe Amatayakul
Maureen Eibeler
Virginie Tan
Betty Zhang
Assistance:
Adam Corrie (Staff)
Roman Trilo