Rachel Ara

Rachel Ara
Rachel Ara at the Courtauld Institute of Art (2018)
Born	1965 Jersey, Channel Islands[1]
Education	Goldsmiths, University of London
Known for	Conceptual art, Data art, Digital art, Contemporary art
Notable work	This Much I'm Worth[2][3]
Awards	Burston award;[4] Lumen Prize artist;[5] Aesthetica Art Prize (2016)[6]
Website	www.2ra.co

Rachel Ara (born 1965, Jersey) is a London-based contemporary British conceptual and data artist.^[7]

Overview

Ara was originally a computer programmer. She then studied for a Fine Art BA degree at Goldsmiths, University of London.^[3]

Ara is an elected Academician of the Royal West of England Academy.^[8] She is also a member of the Royal Society of Sculptors.^[9]

Rachel Ara has exhibited in the Barbican Centre, Whitechapel Gallery, Mall Galleries, The Bomb Factory Art Foundation, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, UK.^[1] Internationally, her works have been exhibited at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul, South Korea, and the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, Austria. She has an interest in data protection with respect to her works.^[10] In a 2019 interview with Vanessa Murrell from DATEAGLE ART, Ara quoted “you can’t make subtle artwork and survive”.^[11] She gives talks on her work,^[12][13] including at the London Design Festival.^[14]

Education

Ara studied BA(Hons) Fine Art at Goldsmiths where she won the Neville Burston Award for the most outstanding student.^[15]

Selected exhibitions

• Vertiginous Data, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA), Seoul, South Korea (23 March – 28 July 2019)^[16]
• Uncanny Values – Artificial Intelligence and You, Vienna Biennale 2019, The Mak, Vienna, Austria (29 May – 6 October 2019)
• Event Two, Royal College of Art, London, UK (12–17 July 2019)
• London Design Week, V&A, London, UK (14–22 October 2019)^[17]

Works in collections

Ara's work has featured at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, including mixed reality nuns as a V&A VARI Artist in Residence.^[18][19]

References

1. "Rachel Ara – Cementing conceptual and physical layers into her practice". dateagle.art. Dateagle Art.
2. Pickford, James (17 June 2018). "Artist Rachel Ara poses unsettling questions for the art world". FT Wealth. Financial Times.
3. "Rachel Ara". anise.gallery. Anise Gallery.
4. "Rachel Ara". www.secondfloor.co.uk. UK: Second Floor Studios & Arts. 2018.
5. Rapoport, Carla (29 January 2019). "The Art of Brexit". Lumen Prize.
6. "Rachel Ara: Reactive Systems". Aesthetica Magazine. 15 August 2018.
7. Ara, Rachel; Giannini, Tula (2019). "Chapter 20: A Conceptual Artists Programming for Social Change". In Giannini, Tula; Bowen, Jonathan P. (eds.). Museums and Digital Culture: New Perspectives and Research. Series on Cultural Computing. Springer. pp. 399–414. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-97457-6_20. ISBN 978-3-319-97456-9. ISSN 2195-9064. S2CID 159042560.
8. "Rachel Ara – Academician RAW MRBS". UK: Royal West of England Academy.
9. "Our Sculptors – Rachel Ara MRSS". UK: Royal Society of Sculptors.
10. Pes, Javier (5 July 2018). "As Museums Across Europe Grapple With New Data Protection Regulations, One Artist Is Pushing Them to Think Differently – The V&A's artist-in-residence, Rachel Ara, has a digital sculpture at the Whitechapel that is watching visitors' every move". Art World. ArtNet.
11. Murrell, Vanessa (25 March 2019). "Cementing conceptual and physical layers into her practice". DATEAGLE ART. Retrieved 6 January 2023.
12. "Thames-Side Studios Talks: Rachel Ara". www.thames-sidestudios.co.uk. UK: Thames-Side Studios. 7 November 2018.
13. Ara, Rachel (2017). "The Making of a Digital (Master)Piece". In Bowen, J.P.; Diprose, G.; Lambert, N. (eds.). EVA London 2017 Conference Proceedings. Electronic Workshops in Computing. BCS. pp. 327–334. doi:10.14236/ewic/eva2017.67. ISBN 978-1-78017-399-3. ISSN 1477-9358.
14. "The Transubstantiation of Knowledge: Behind the work with Rachel Ara". www.londondesignfestival.com. London Design Festival. 2019.
15. "The Neville Burston Award for Painting". Goldsmiths, University of London. Retrieved 30 December 2020.
16. Chun, Wendy Hui Kyoung (2019). "Big Data as Drama". Vertiginous Data. Seoul: National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art. pp. 88–145.
17. "V&A · This Much I'm Worth". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 9 December 2019.
18. Feldman, Rachel (15 August 2018). "VARI Artist Rachel Ara introduces mixed reality nuns to the V&A". VARI. UK: Victoria and Albert Museum.
19. Victoria and Albert Museum (15 April 2019). "Artist in Residence: Rachel Ara". YouTube.

External links

• Official website
• Rachel Ara on Twitter
• Rachel Ara on Instagram
• Rachel Ara on LinkedIn