IAN CHENG

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Ian Cheng is originally from California where he earned two BA degrees, one in Art Practice and one in Cognitive Science, both from UC Berkeley. He worked at George Lucas’s visual effects company, Industrial Light and Magic, and went on to earn an MFA from Columbia University. Since 2012, Ian has produced a series of digital artworks exploring “an agent’s capacity to deal with an ever-changing environment.” Ian’s work consists of extensively developed characters and environments that are animated by artificial intelligence technology and videogame engines and set loose in open-ended simulations. The combination of his comprehensive approach to world-building with the work’s capacity to evolve across exhibitions on its own makes up what Ian calls “art with a nervous system.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST TALK

Worlding

Tuesday, October 5, 2021
In his Attention Series Artist Talk titled Wordling, Ian gives a tour of his projects including the AI-driven artificial life BOB (Bag of Beliefs) and, Life After BOB, an anime miniseries produced using the Unity videogame engine that imagines a world in which a mad scientist installs BOB into the nervous system of his young daughter, Chalice. Ian’s work brings our attention to the point at which advanced technologies intersect with some of the most intimate relationships in our lives, as well as the most urgent issues of our culture and time. Interjecting narrative and even the viewer’s influence into his simulations, Ian’s work provocatively investigates what we know and don’t know about motivation, meaning, purpose, chaos, freedom, mutation, and change, and our ability to cope, or not cope, with all of these issues. Ian’s artistic work and research reveal the cultural impact of the artist on our understanding of being human, including all of our beautiful and horrific potentialities.

Ian Cheng. B.O.B. Courtesy of the artist.

Ian Cheng. Courtesy of the artist.

Private events for the rmcad community

Next Day Q+A

Wednesday, October 6, 2021
RMCAD students, faculty, and staff gathered for a casual conversation with visiting artist Ian Cheng to ask questions about Cheng’s work and career and get professional advice from this thought-provoking and innovative contemporary artist. 

Class Visit with Ian Cheng

Wednesday, October 6, 2021
Ian Cheng spent time with the Character + Level Design class in the Game Art Department as part of his visit. Students in this class had the phenomenal opportunity to talk to Cheng about the narrative agents he developed in the Emissaries trilogy and his recent AI creature BOB (Bag of Beliefs). 

Recommendation List

VASD Program guests provide a recommendation list that gives insight into their work, practice, and research. Artist Ian Cheng’s recommends:

  • Morning Pages developed by Julia Cameron (writing exercise) 

  • Impro by Keith Johnstone (book)

  • What Do You Say After You Say Hello? by Eric Berne (book)

  • “The Key To Act Two” by Venkatesh Rao (online article)

  • Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud (comics)

  • Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction by Ursula Le Guin (book)

  • Succession, Jesse Armstrong Creator/Executive Producer (HBO series)

  • Watchmen, Damon Lindelof Writer/Producer (HBO series)

  • Princess Mononoke by Hayao Miyazaki (animated film)

  • Symbol by Susumu Yokota (album)

  • The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of The Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes (book)

  • Tesla AI Day: www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0z4FweCy4M