{"id":13933,"date":"2025-07-21T22:03:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T22:03:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/13933\/"},"modified":"2025-07-21T22:03:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T22:03:12","slug":"offlines-mika-bar-on-nesher-on-the-urgency-of-showing-digital-art-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/13933\/","title":{"rendered":"Offline’s Mika Bar-On Nesher on the Urgency of Showing Digital Art Now"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tEarlier this month, Offline, a new, brick-and-mortar gallery created by digital marketplace SuperRare<\/a>, opened the evocatively titled group exhibition<\/a>, \u201cMythologies for a Spiritually Void Time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile Offline did a soft launch in April, the current exhibition is the first open to the public, and it has been accompanied by a week of performances and talks to celebrate. It\u2019s all part of what gallery director Mika Bar-On Nesher hopes becomes an ongoing IRL community space for digital artists, their collectors, and the wider community of digital art<\/a> enthusiasts.. <\/p>\n

\t\tRelated Articles<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Racquel<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cPeople are almost shy to say \u2018digital art movement,\u2019 but I\u2019m proud of it because there are real pioneers,\u201d Bar-On Nesher told ARTnews in a recent interview. \u201cThere are many artists who are proudly working with digital tools, and they deserve to be, first of all, honored\u2014because this is not something that was invented in 2020.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMythologies,\u201d which runs through July 25 at 245 Bowery in New York, marks something of a turning point for Offline, as it features 15 artists whose work encompasses painting, animation, sculpture, bio-art, and networked media, rather than solely work that lives on a screen. For Bar-On Nesher, Offline is about expanding the boundaries of what is considered digital art.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere are a lot of misconceptions about digital art\u2014that it doesn\u2019t involve the artist\u2019s hand. But the artist must have a vision or something to express. All this technology, from what I\u2019ve seen, is just a set of tools,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen people come in and see these digital practices embodied through sculpture, dance, painting\u2014it honestly feels like there\u2019s so much to explore.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tARTnews\u00a0spoke with Bar-On Nesher by video conference to talk about the development of digital art after the post-Covid NFT boom, why digital art feels \u201chonest\u201d in an increasingly online world, and how Offline can point audiences toward a new relationship with technology.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and concision.<\/p>\n

\n\tARTnews: You\u2019ve described Offline as an \u201cinterdisciplinary art space.\u201d Why did you feel it was important to stake out that identity, and how does it diverge from SuperRare\u2019s origins as primarily a platform for NFTs<\/a>?<\/p>\n

\n\tMika Bar-On Nesher: It\u2019s a big question because I\u2019ve been part of the digital art movement for a long time. I curated my first digital artwork back in 2016, and I remember it was almost a hilariously existential moment where I was like, \u201cDo I print it? Do I put it on a screen?\u201d There were all these limitations around how to display, how to talk about digital art. That has changed since then, obviously. The post-Covid, NFT-crypto culture peak was dramatic and insane and brought together very unlikely people from all over the world who shared a sensibility of doing things differently. That was very cool. I was personally very drawn to the royalties and the provenance possibilities of blockchain. Those were things that were blatantly missing from the traditional art world, in my view. And now, we\u2019ve come to a place where technology moves really fast. People don\u2019t remember things. ChatGPT has only been with us a very short while, and it\u2019s already transformed the way we do so many different things.<\/p>\n

\n\tTo have a gallery that\u2019s dedicated to digital art without hiding the use of digital tools\u2014there\u2019s a lot of taboo around it\u2014is unique. A lot of artists don\u2019t want to be affiliated with NFTs or with the 2022 NFT boom because it was a moment of hype that has passed. Offline is really about showcasing the most cutting-edge artists and technologies, because things are changing fast. At our previous exhibition, in June, we showed holograms and animations<\/a>. And for that exhibition, the work was physical. At the opening, people kept asking, \u201cAre you going to keep doing this? Or are you going back to screens?\u201d I remember saying, \u201cI truly don\u2019t know,\u201d because things are changing so fast and we want to actually reflect what\u2019s happening in real time.<\/p>\n

\n\tA downside of the 2022 NFT boom was that NFTs and digital art became lumped together. But an upside, perhaps, was that many people were onboarded into seeing this kind of work for the first time\u2014often in its native online context. What then do you see as the value of creating a physical space for it?<\/p>\n

People are almost shy to say \u201cdigital art movement,\u201d but I\u2019m proud of it because there are real pioneers. [British artist and designer] Brendan Dawes just released a documentary <\/a>on Brian Eno [with filmmaker Gary Hustwit] that is a new kind of generative film. There are many artists who are proudly working with digital tools, and they deserve to be, first of all, honored\u2014because this is not something that was invented in 2020. That\u2019s one thing. But the second is that I find the digital art movement no different from any other art movement in the sense that every movement comes in cycles of hype and dismissal. People think this is new, but it\u2019s actually a pattern we\u2019ve seen over and over again.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat\u2019s so cool is that every art movement challenges what art is, and the way we define it<\/a> changes through generations and decades \u2026 I think back to the Minimalists a lot\u2014how when they fabricated their massive pieces the artist\u2019s hand was invisible. These pieces were so big galleries had to expand to accommodate them. The white cube is fairly new. That\u2019s not how art was always displayed. I\u2019ve always been someone who\u2019s not afraid to go into the new, into the cringe, into the evolving. I love that meme of artists and collectors\u2014the two economies. A good gallery or art space is able to encompass both.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tYaloo\u2019s (2025), installed view, in \u201cMythologies for a Spiritually Void Time,\u201d at Offline, New York. The steel sculptural work is derived from Shininho World Tour, a multi-channel video installation that follows the maritime adventures of Shininho\u2014an 86-year-old K-pop idol and pirate ship captain.<\/p>\n

\n\tIs the goal to situate digital art within the white cube? Or are you imagining how to break out of the traditional gallery format and remake the space in a way that makes more sense for digital art?<\/p>\n

The gallery model we know is falling apart. We see that with so many gallery closings<\/a>. But there are so many systems in our world that are shutting down or rearranging. I can\u2019t sugarcoat it\u2014we\u2019re living through a pretty difficult decade. We have to have spaces that show art that\u2019s relevant to what\u2019s happening. We live in a digital world. People have entire digital lives. Many live double lives online. Dentists use AI. Just in the last year, so many people have started using ChatGPT.<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019ve been an AI nerd for a long time, so it\u2019s funny to see everything enter the mainstream. It\u2019s tricky to say we\u2019re a gallery that specializes in digital art because I would also be very open to showing painters whose work is informed by digital practices. Essentially, the way I look at it is that digital art is contemporary art because we live in a digital world.<\/p>\n

\n\tAt this year\u2019s Art Basel Hong Kong, several galleries were showing physical works\u2014produced by the hand of the artist\u2014that embedded AI<\/a> in some way. One of the more interesting things happening now is how artists are blurring the lines between man and machine and trying to find synthesis.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s this quote from Brian Eno about the relationship between art and new technology: \u201cWhatever you now find weird, ugly, uncomfortable and nasty about a new medium will surely become its signature.\u201d The idea is that clever artists take a new technology, flip it, and use it to create something else.<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019ve always felt that art and technology are not very different. Reality is a matter of habit. At one point, paper was a new technology and people no longer had to memorize things or carve in stone. People are so afraid of technology. They\u2019re always afraid of the new, which brings me back to these cycles of hype and dismissal that all art movements experience.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe reason people fear the new is that it alters their sense of time\u2014how long something takes\u2014and that changes their sense of reality. For example, AI can cut down production time, and then it changes the whole concept of work. It shifts our sense of time, space, and reality. Art does this too, in an amazing way. That\u2019s why I\u2019ve always felt the two were actually very connected. I never felt there was much dissonance between the two practices. A lot of technologists are very creative, and a lot of artists are very technical or technological. Offline is about collapsing binaries, which is something we need more of in the world right now.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter the 2022 NFT boom, a lot of museums and galleries began resurfacing the long history of digital art. I\u2019m thinking of recent exhibitions for Vera Moln\u00e1r<\/a> at the Centre Pompidou in Paris or Harold Cohen\u2019s AARON<\/a> at the Whitney Museum in New York. Do you see building historical scaffolding around digital art as a core part of the gallery?<\/p>\n

Yes. It\u2019s very important to me to show both the pioneers and the brand-new voices. I really love honoring a tradition\u2014the roots of it. The NFT craze was really strange in a lot of ways. It was a wild thing to ride out. The positive side is that it brought digital art to a place where people couldn\u2019t look away from it.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere were obviously pros and cons, but one thing I found interesting was that it created a new class of collectors\u2014specifically people who wanted to buy digital art\u2014that hadn\u2019t existed before. I\u2019m not sure how many times in history we\u2019ve seen the birth of a brand-new class of collectors. Also, a lot of artists who were buried in day jobs as designers were liberated to become full-time artists. That was new and exciting at the time.<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t really look at any of this as good or bad. Digital art has been around as long as we\u2019ve had computers. We\u2019re following a pattern of accepting our new realities as a whole.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tX.S. Hou and Will Freudenheim, hallucinations on polycephalum I, 2025, physarum polycephalum slime mold grown on silk, pen plotter.<\/p>\n

\n\tOffline is one of very few galleries focused specifically on digital art and treating it with seriousness. The gallery in a way has the ability to help define the boundaries of what is or isn\u2019t acceptable within this space. How do you, as a curator, determine those boundaries?<\/p>\n

There are a lot of misconceptions about digital art\u2014that it doesn\u2019t involve the artist\u2019s hand. But the artist must have a vision or something to express. All this technology, from what I\u2019ve seen, is just a set of tools. We\u2019ve seen artists use literal garbage<\/a> on the street as tools. We focus on showing artists who\u2019ve been around for a long time, many of whom are pioneers, and we also show those breaking away from the screen\u2014from what people think digital art should be. We\u2019ve also shown some performance art, which most people don\u2019t think of as digital, but really, every living artist is living in a digital world. Where does it break apart?<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat made \u201cMythologies for a Spiritually Void Time\u201d the right exhibition to launch the space publicly?<\/p>\n

This exhibition was very unique because it had two guest curators, X.S. Hou and Jack Wedge. We wanted to put on an art festival. But it is a group show, and I really recognized their vision. With SuperRare, we\u2019ve been shepherding and supporting some of the biggest digital artists, many of whom have gone on to work with incredible people. For this inaugural show, I really wanted to open the door to the new generation of digital artists and see what\u2019s happening in New York, what people are making. Of course, we\u2019re a gallery, and it\u2019s a business, and we have other kinds of drops and shows. But I wanted to start with a celebration\u2014because we\u2019re living in a time when a lot of digital art people have always had secret lives. You had your online crypto life, then your normal gallery life. It\u2019s an interesting time to collapse that.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn terms of how Offline operates: Are these selling exhibitions? How do you define success as a gallery? And how does the relationship with SuperRare work?<\/p>\n

Obviously, sales are very important. Sales are important for artists. Our business is its own thing, separate from SuperRare, that we\u2019re developing. SuperRare is a marketplace, and we\u2019re very lucky to be associated with it. For this show specifically, all proceeds go to the artists. It was really just an invitation to celebrate and bring in new voices.<\/p>\n

\n\tGoing forward, will Offline stage shows at the pace of a traditional gallery\u2014every six weeks or so\u2014or are you imagining something different?<\/p>\n

We\u2019re not going to follow the traditional timeline. Some shows will be longer, some shorter, depending on the artist and the project. In the crypto or NFT space, things move really fast. So there are times we want to slow it down, and times we can keep up that pace. We\u2019re looking to create a new type of model that brings people together and creates experiences. I don\u2019t want to fit into the old mold necessarily, but I\u2019m also not here to break the rules without understanding where we\u2019ve come from and where we want to go. For now, the goal is to let people come in and have shared experiences\u2014because technology can be very isolating.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo, if I understand correctly: Offline is an independent business supported by SuperRare, but you still need to sell work to stay relevant.<\/p>\n

Yeah, we\u2019re not just a showroom. We\u2019re operating as a gallery. I suppose it\u2019s a little unusual because the typical gallery model is either a commercial gallery or an artist-run space. There are lots of different kinds of galleries, but since we\u2019re linked to a marketplace, this is really an extension of our curatorial vision. It\u2019s also about creating a community space.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe other side is putting on music shows, performances, and other gatherings that bring people together. What makes us a healthy society is having art that reflects back what we\u2019re experiencing to a certain degree. It\u2019s very liberating to have that.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tA view of the opening for \u201cMythologies for a Spiritually Void Time\u201d at Offline Gallery.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s a lot of variety in the digital work being created. But do you see certain critiques of culture or technology that feel more powerful when presented in a digital context?<\/p>\n

What I like about digital art is that a lot of it feels honest because it reflects the digital. We can\u2019t escape the fact that we have digital experiences. We all have things that we experience in the world that are purely digital or are filtered through that.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s funny\u2014we\u2019re just now inventing the words to talk about digital art. There\u2019s already so much language around painting and sculpture. Everyone knows what the terms mean. For digital art, writers, curators, and artists are still developing how to speak about it. It\u2019s fresh in a way. That\u2019s where we lean into the tradition of pioneers\u2014artists who\u2019ve been doing this since the 1970s and \u201980s\u2014and we look toward the future, to the kids doing insane stuff right now. The language is coming together, and museums are starting to collect and exhibit this work. But there was just so much taboo until very recently.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat do you think the institutional or contemporary art world still doesn\u2019t understand about digital or crypto-native work?<\/p>\n

They\u2019re doing a good job\u2014it\u2019s just a slow integration. Digital moves fast, and institutions move slowly. That\u2019s the dissonance we\u2019re experiencing. Everyone\u2019s doing their best to understand. Some of the concepts are very abstract. Do you remember trying to explain to someone what an NFT was? It was ridiculous. But it\u2019s not so different from trying to explain conceptual art or Minimalism.<\/p>\n

\n\tArtists are challenging reality as it is. They challenge how we think things should be. And thank God for artists who do that. If we didn\u2019t have people willing to report back from places most sane people won\u2019t go. We\u2019re lucky to have them. They keep society healthy, and we need that right now. We need art that\u2019s relevant, that\u2019s truly contemporary.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tThomas Ludacer, Sconce, Sconce, 2025, oak, acrylic, hardware.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou mentioned earlier that language is still being built around digital art. A lot of the critique of contemporary art is that academic language actually keeps people out\u2014it\u2019s alienating. Do you see this new movement as a chance to build something more accessible?<\/p>\n

I really hope so. The art world we know isn\u2019t very accessible. There are a lot of unwritten rules. It\u2019s a complicated system. I often find that when a door opens for a new movement, a few artists go blue-chip and then everything closes again. There\u2019s an opening and a closing. Even though I\u2019ve seen a lot, I remain pretty optimistic that we can create art experiences that are accessible, profitable for artists, meaningful, and contemporary. Crazier things have happened.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou might be the only techno-optimist I\u2019ve met in the last year.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the funny thing. People are afraid of digital art. People are afraid of technology. People are afraid of AI because they feel threatened by it. But I have a lot of faith in humanity. People need people. We need artists. We need collectors. We need each other. Technology can make it feel like you don\u2019t need to meet up\u2014you can just text. Or you don\u2019t need a therapist\u2014you can talk to ChatGPT. But I\u2019d argue it doesn\u2019t have to be that way. You can have contemporary digital art and in-person experiences that are different. The crypto phenomenon and the digital art movement flipped a lot of things on their heads. That\u2019s exciting.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe democratic promise of crypto.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s good and bad in everything. Every tool has a dark side. But there\u2019s also a positive side to everything we do. Everything is complex. I guess I\u2019m just on a mission to honor the pioneers, make room for new voices, and get people together around performance, music, and art. Synthesizers are technology, after all. You know what I mean? We need less fear\u2014and more people coming together.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Earlier this month, Offline, a new, brick-and-mortar gallery created by digital marketplace SuperRare, opened the evocatively titled group…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13934,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[6225,6485,6486,1120,9319,96,9320,9321,9322,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-13933","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-design","12":"tag-digital-art","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-newsmakers","15":"tag-nfts","16":"tag-superrare","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom","19":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13933"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13933\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}