The Role Of Curatorial Studios In The Digital Art Ecosystem

Purgatory Edit by Ali Akbar Mehta, Digital Intimacies, Late at Tate Britain, Curated by Hervisions.

Courtesy Dan Weill and HervisionsIn an era of incessant image production and reproduction, how does cultural relevance emerge? Who dares sift through presently developing tendencies to spotlight artists whose work is lightyears ahead of the curve, contextualizing it alongside comparable avantgarde explorations of the past? Who ventures to filter innovation from novelty?

Enter the curatorial studio.

Cibelle Cavalli Bastos, A Picture Can’t Take Me (left), AES+F, Turandot 2070, Lynx Avatar (center) ... More and Lovers I (right), I KNOW exhibition, Curated by synthesis for Feral File.

Courtesy of the artists and synthesis galleryAs Vitale explained via exclusive conversation with Forbes: “Our goal was to create a context where artists working with immersion were taken seriously, both conceptually and materially. It wasn’t just about hanging screens and headsets on white walls; it was about crafting environments that honored the specificity of these practices while inviting broader conversations about how technology shapes identity, perception, and society.”

MORE FOR YOUA show like Material Poetry builds two types of bridges: one between legacy new media institutions and dynamically evolving modes of expression and another between artistic practices at different stages of development. Each is equally important.

Both Hervisions and synthesis cite a desire to challenge the dominance of the white-cube exhibition in their approach, privileging non-traditional presentations of artworks, such as when Hervisions released a mobile-friendly video game in partnership with William Morris Gallery in 2023 or when synthesis showed Cahill’s work at the former airport in Berlin’s Tempelhofer Feld in 2021.

When I spoke to Jabbar for Forbes, she reminisced about her studio’s origins: “I hoped to carve out space for a different kind of future, one where speculative thinking, intersectional feminism, and digital aesthetics could meet on equal terms.”

Bionic Step by Nina Davies, Digital Intimacies, Late at Tate Britain curated by Hervisions.

Dan WeillJabbar certainly delivered this via Late at Tate Britain’s art and tech program, Digital Intimacies, via which she transformed the museum into an affective landscape peppered with the works of artist like Alex Quicho, Chia Amisola, and Romy Gad el Rab in ways that privileged “the confusion, the glitch and the beauty of love, loss and connection."

A major takeaway, Jabbar cites, is the realization of "how vital it is to protect that sense of mess, immediacy, and openness within institutional contexts. People aren’t just receptive to it, they’re hungry for it. I’m excited to keep building on this model. Whether through nomadic formats, durational gatherings, or layered commissions, I want to continue creating curatorial experiences that centre risk, emergence, and relationality.”

Emi Kusano, Algorhythm of Narcissus, AI-generated video, The Second Guess: Body Anxiety in the Age ... More of AI, 2025.

Courtesy of the artist and The Second GuessHowever, there was so much collector interest in the exhibition’s works, that Murphy and Meier transformed The Second Guess into a curatorial studio and partnered with the Tezos blockchain and OBJKT platform to present future commercially available shows.

Addie Wagenknecht, The Perfect Women, Computational, 2024, The Second Guess: Body Anxiety in the Age ... More of AI.

Courtesy of the artist and The Second GuessA marked throughline of Meier and Murphy’s first exhibition was “the radical emergence of social media,” a new dynamic with which contemporary artists – and the artworld ecosystem at large – must grapple. Their most recent endeavor saw them bring similar themes to Basel, where they presented at digital art fair ArtMeta, adopting a gallery model.

With Wu’s keen curatorial eye, it’s no surprise that entire exhibitions have been acquired by institutions: the LACMA recently acquired their 2022 exhibition ECHOES. EPOCH has also opened their doors to guest curators, notably April Baca, Katie Peyton Hofstadter, Nora N. Khan and Andrea Bellini, who curated a show for EPOCH at the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève.

A RADIANT FUTURE, featuring work by Claudia Brăileanu, Ceren Su Çelik, Chris Coleman, Harriet Davey, ... More Sophie Kahn, Parag K. Mital, nouseskou, and Yoshi Sodeoka; Curated by Peter Wu+.

Courtesy of EPOCHIt's Dark Inside, Evelyn Bencicova, 2019

Courtesy of the artist and synthesis gallery As Vitale eloquently puts: “Curatorial studios have a kind of nimbleness and closeness to artists that big institutions often can’t match. We can walk alongside artists as their practices evolve, offering curatorial frameworks while their work is still taking shape. We create spaces where experimentation is embraced, while resisting the flattening effect of trends—making sure younger artists don’t just ‘surface’ briefly but are rooted within the larger conversations they’re actively shaping.”

In the case of curatorial studios, no rules are written, giving them the freedom and flexibility to be bold.

Disclaimer: As a digital artist, I’ve exhibited in exhibitions curated by most of the curatorial studios presented in this article.