Lawrence Lek, NOX (video still). Courtesy of the artist and Sadie Coles HQ

What happens when machines develop their own form of autonomous consciousness? This question has long been at the center of sci-fi novels and films until it became the lingering dilemma—and fear—that now accompanies today’s debates on A.I. That question also sits at the center of Lawrence Lek’s layered digital narrative at the Bass Museum of Art, where he is currently staging a series of works from his fictional universe centered on NOX (short for ‘Nonhuman Excellence’), a therapy center for sentient self-driving cars undergoing psychological treatment for problems rooted in their own self-awareness, with mental breakdowns, distractions and malfunctions that interfere with the jobs they were designed to perform. The multidimensional cinematic and game-specific experience the London-based artist presents is marked by a level of conceptual and critical complexity that imposes a different tempo than one might expect amid the brisk chaos of Art Basel Miami Beach. Yet these works were among the most compelling encounters outside the fair, prompting as they did a timely reflection on our contemporary condition across shifting dynamics of labor, automation, agency and intelligence.

Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter

Thank you for signing up!

By clicking submit, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime.

Operating within a form of speculative realism, Lek uses the imaginative fluidity of digital simulation to stage an allegory of dissociation and alienation. On view at the Bass is a site-specific multimedia installation and game environment that merges physical multi-floor installations, virtual world-building and locative sound. In two connected galleries, Lek invites viewers to empathize with these artificial entities as they experience and question personhood and culpability within systems of surveillance, rehabilitation and justice—an open flow of consciousness that resonates unsettlingly with our own.

His digital narrative brings together both existing and newly commissioned works drawn from the more expansive Smart City Saga (2021-2024), a series of speculative films and immersive installations in which he explores the psychological and political lives of nonhuman characters in fictional smart cities. “I’m interested in imagining a new point of view—a new kind of subjectivity—belonging to life forms that aren’t human,” Lek explained when Observer spoke with him at the opening. “That’s really the political and conceptual terrain of the work.”

Lek’s medium is a potentially endless form of worldbuilding, an artistic universe that spans cinema, architecture, music and games. “I’m interested in the kinds of narratives that can only unfold........

© Observer