The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and LG award the LG Guggenheim Prize 2024 to Shu Lea Cheang. The Net art pioneer, whose interdisciplinary practice spans more than three decades, is the second recipient of the LG Guggenheim Art and Technology Initiative, a five-year collaboration between the New York institution and LG, a technology innovator and global leader in consumer electronics, chemicals and automotive components, to support and promote artists working at the intersection of art and technology.
“Shu Lea Cheang was one of the first to recognize the liberatory potential of the digital realm. We celebrate her bold explorations of bodies, and their desires, in our digital and analog worlds, and are thrilled, alongside LG, to recognize her necessary work,” says Naomi Beckwith, Deputy Director and Chief Curator Jennifer and David Stockman at the Guggenheim.
Since the 1990s, she has dealt with emerging technologies (often from their inception) in countless forms, including as theme, tool and medium, developing a remarkable understanding of their complexity and their role in shaping society. Her use of code, game engines, software design, hacking strategies and traditional mediums such as installations, film and performance in her multifaceted projects reflects her unique approach to art making and rejects neat categorisations.
In addition to her pioneering work in Net art, she had an early vision of alternative currencies and decentralised organisations with Garlic=Rich Air (2002-), investigated gamified societies with Bowling Alley (1995), probed biotechnologies in Locker Baby Project (2001-2012) and explored their changing nature in Mycelium Network Society (2017-).
Her work is deeply rooted in her interests in science fiction, queer aesthetics and community building. Her explorations of social structures in networked societies have advanced our understanding of the circulation of information and the ways in which people communicate. She used analogue communication tools in Those Fluttering Objects of Desire (1992-93), motion sensors and data management systems in BabyPlay (2001), to develop an alternative technological approach based on shared production. She is also an accomplished filmmaker and has produced and directed four feature films: Fresh Kill (1994), I.K.U. (2000), Fluidø (2017) and UKI (2023). Cheang’s installation, Utter (2023), is an example of how she has turned her attention to the social implications of machine learning in recent years.
Cheang will receive an unrestricted honorarium of $100,000 to celebrate his innovative achievements in this field. This year’s jury consisted of Eungie Joo, Curator and Head of Contemporary Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Koyo Kouoh, Executive Director and Chief Curator, Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art, Cape Town; Noam Segal, Associate Curator LG Electronics, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Director, Castello di Rivoli Museum of Contemporary Art, Turin; and Stephanie Dinkins, artist and inaugural recipient of the LG Guggenheim Prize.
LG Guggenheim Prize 2024.Shu Lea Cheang
Shu Lea Cheang, will be celebrated on 2 April at the 2024 YCC Party sponsored by LG Display. Three more artists will be honoured until 2027. A public programme in the Peter B. Lewis Theater on 2 May will be an opportunity to hear directly from the artist who will talk about her creative practice and new works in development.
Shu Lea Cheang is an American-Taiwanese-French artist and filmmaker. She is celebrated as a Net art pioneer with Brandon (1998–99), the first web art commissioned by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Cheang represented Taiwan with 3x3x6, a mixed-media installation at 2019 Venice Biennale: May You Live In Interesting Times. Her feature-length films have been shown at LAS Art Foundation, Berlin; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Institute for Contemporary Art, London; among many other venues. She has exhibited at many experimental and established institutions, including Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona; Tai Kwun, Hong Kong; Museion Bolzano, Italy; Singapore Art Museum; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens; Museo Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; FACT Center, Liverpool. She has participated in international shows such as the Whitney Biennial for American Art (1993, 1995); Johannesburg Biennial (1997); Documenta 14 (2017); Gwangju Biennial (2018); Taipei Biennial (2018); Performa Biennial (2019); and Venice Biennale (2003, 2019, 2024). Her work is in the collections of Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; NTT InterCommunication Center, Tokyo; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; KADIST Foundation; Foundation Museion; Centre Pompidou, Paris; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.
images (cover 1) Shu Lea Cheang, «UKI», 2023, still, digital color video, with sound, 80’ (2) Shu Lea Cheang, «Baby Love» (from «Locker Baby Project»), 2005. Networked media installation, dimensions variable. Installation view: «Baby Love», Palais de Tokyo, Paris, December 8, 2005–January 8, 2006. Photo: Florian Kleinefenn (3) Shu Lea Cheang, «Uttering», 2023. Digital color video, silent, 36 min., 26′ (4) Shu Lea Cheang with Dondon Hounwn, «Hagay Dreaming», 2023, performed at Taipei Backstage Pool, Taiwan, October 28–29, 2023. Documentary photograph. Photo: Hsun Lang Lin
