Artistic Practice

Dr Stanza is an independent artist based in London who has been exhibiting worldwide since 1982. His work lives at the intersection of art and potential futures of disruptive and opportunistic nature, delving into scenarios of observation, invisible agency, and the changing human environment. The artworks demonstrate how humans are complicit and thus entangled in the surveyed and monitored technological layers they communicate. They fit seamlessly into what he calls 'panoptic aesthetics'. The technologies incorporated in his digital artworks can include, custom-made sensors, networked cameras, robotics, and computers. What becomes real are the art installations, sculptures, websites, software systems, and paintings Stanza exhibits. Stanza's artworks have won twenty international art prizes and art awards including:- Vidalife 6.0 First Prize Spain. SeNef Grand Prix Korea. Videobrasil First Prize Brazil. Cynet Art First Prize Germany. Share First Prize Winner Italy:

His art has also been rewarded with a prestigious Starts Residency, Nesta Dreamtime Award, an Arts Humanities Creative Fellowship a Clarks bursary, and numerous international arts residencies. His artworks have been exhibited in over one hundred exhibitions globally including- Venice Biennale Italy: Deutsches Museum Germany: Victoria Albert Museum: Tate Britain: Rijksmuseum Twente: HNF Germany: Bruges Museum Belgium: Fundacion Telefonica in Spain: TSSK Norway: Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo Mexico: Plymouth Arts Centre UK: ICA London UK: State Museum, Novosibirsk: Biennale of Sydney: Sao Paulo Biennale: De Markten Brussels: Museum Of Cyptography Moscow: Transport Museum London: Haifa Museum: QUAD Derby UK: FACT Liverpool UK: Ars Nova Museum Finland: York Art Gallery: Salisbury Cathedral: Centre des Arts Les Bain France: Bury Art Museum, UK: Kellen Gallery USA: Samek Art Museum USA: Shrewsbury Museum UK: Samsung Media Centre Korea: Heinz Nixdorf Museum Germany: Järvenpää Art Museum: Multimedia Art Museum Moscow: Quays Culture, Wolverhampton Art Gallery: The Open Data Institute: The Goodwood Festival Of Speed: The Lowry: Mundo Urbano Spain:

His most recent work connects data streams from ‘Smart Cities’ speculating on ideas for merging various types of data using methods of artificial intelligence AI and ML learning to create new artistic scenarios. The thrust of these artworks aims to show what happens when the public is allowed to make their own mixes and visualisations with the data, reclaiming ownership and representing data in new and different ways.

Some of his most well known digital art projects include: -

• The Nemesis Machine: Manifestation (2023). AI machine learning artwork accessing thousands of real time data feeds.
• Living Landscapes (2021). Hyrbrid social data maps and electronic art constructions.
• Velocity (2019). A custom made software to track participants in the city demonstrating entangled citizen participation.
• The Nemesis Machine (2010-2019). A sculptural artwork informed by real time data analysis of city spaces.
• The Binary Graffiti Club Choir. Singing binary messages across the city. Public engagement project.
• The Reader (2015). What happens when machine intelligence becomes part of our human fabric
• The Agency At The End Of Civilisation (2015). A real time interpretation of millions of data sets for predictive futures.
• Be Herd Above The Noise (2010). The city as system of music using thousands of sounds on hundreds of speakers.
• Soundcities (1997- 2020). How to experience the whole world as a system of sound.
• Sensity (2006-2009). How can the invisible be made visible by using sensors and representing data about the environment?
• Visitors to A Gallery (2004) and Public Domain (2008). The gallery visitors become bits of information and part of the artwork inside a surveillance system.
• Genomixer (2004). A series of online artworks made using the artists DNA sequence.
• Urban Generation (2002) Do we live in a giant global surveillance system?

Stanza was one of the first artists to use the internet as an art medium. His major online projects include the Netart archive, soundcities.com (a global soundmap project 1997-2020), genomixer.com (DNA-based artworks 2000), thecentralcity.co.uk (urban and city systems 1996), amorphoscapes.co.uk (generative painting 1997), and soundtoys.net (an online curated art portal 1996 + now offline).

Dr Stanza AKA Steve Tanza (PhD, MA, BA, Cert Ed, PG Dip) studied art at Goldsmiths College University of London, Greenwich University, Central Saint Martins and University Of Westminster London. Stanza was also an AHRC arts research fellow at Goldsmiths College.

Portrait of the artist Stanza. Hi res here.

Artworks produced trace an interest in the city metropolis from the linear city (paintings music video) to the interactive city (softwre, websites, touch screens), the generative city (installations, software), the emergent city (installations, sculptures, software), to entangled cities (AI, installation, software, data)