New Exhibition Investigates the Historical, Contemporary, and Prospective Aspects of Ryoji Ikeda

The exhibition, which is on display until December 28, features four new pieces in conjunction with the complete data-verse trilogy by Ikeda.

Image courtesy of the Artist and National Asian Culture Center

In celebration of its 10th anniversary, the National Asian Culture Center (ACC) in Gwangju, South Korea, engages Ryoji Ikeda, the pivotal artist who contributed to its inception. The institution welcomes Ikeda back for his first return since the first “test pattern [nº8],” presenting a new solo exhibition that reflects on a decade of creative innovation and conceptual developments.

Image courtesy of the Artist and National Asian Culture Center

For Ikeda, data serves more as aesthetic material than as a source of knowledge. The artist has dedicated more than thirty years to expanding the limits of vision by converting raw data into immersive experiences that challenge the essence of reality in the digital era.

Image courtesy of the Artist and National Asian Culture Center

The current exhibition features seven works, including the whole data-verse trilogy. In addition to “dataverse 1/2/3,” four new works are being exhibited for the first time: “data.flux (n˚2),” “critical mass,” “sleeping beauty,” and “data.gram (n˚8).” These pieces underscore advancements in the artist's practice and technology since his 2015 ACC presentation.

Encouraging audiences to reflect on humanity's position in a code-driven world, Ikeda extracts beauty from computational byproducts, providing a profound contemplation on the experience of perception and existence in an era of information saturation.

ACC Focus 2025: Ryoji Ikeda is now shown till December 28.

National Asian Culture Center, 38 Munhwajeondang-ro, Dong-gu, Gwangju, South Korea