Join Access Gallery online for Vertical Worlds: a panel discussion on atmospherics, aerial visual tactics, and embodiment featuring panelists Ala Roushan, Serena Lee, and Steven Cottingham.
Free registration is required for this event.
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Ala Roushan is an artist/curator whose work explores artificial environments at the intersection of art, architecture, and technology. Ala’s project, Shaping Atmospheres, was presented Fall 2024 as an exhibition and symposium, exploring the critical implications of today’s solar politics and speculations on solar geoengineering. Most recently, she co-directed a new film, commissioned for MUDAC Museum, Lausanne 2025, tilted A Shroud Woven of Solar Threads—returning to the ancient Sun worship of Mitra thousands of years ago during a climate crisis. Previously, she produced BREATHLESS at The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery—a multifaceted project examining the paradoxes of air and breathing. In 2023, Ala held a research position at the University of Tokyo, she is an Associate Professor at OCAD University.
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Serena Lee is interested in how energy circulates. Playing with cinema, movement, place-making, sound, performance, writing, and collective study, her artistic practice is a mode of inquiry, unfolding through situated and collaborative processes. Her research on taijiquan as a method of aesthetic inquiry was shared as an exhibition and study program at Casco Art Institute (Utrecht, NL) in Spring 2025. Serena is based between Toronto and Vienna where she completed a PhD at the Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien.
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Steven Cottingham’s work engages with virtual realism and the politics of visualization. His practice critically examines the influence of emerging image technologies through case studies including bodycams, surveillance advertising, military simulation software, and AI in prisons. Cottingham’s work has recently been presented at Dazibao (Montreal, 2025), Center for Performance Research (New York, 2024), Wil Aballe Art Projects (Vancouver, 2023), The 8th Floor (New York, 2023), Catriona Jeffries (Vancouver, 2023), ENTRE (Vienna, 2023), Natalia Hug Galerie (Cologne, 2022), and Artists Space (New York, 2022). He has undertaken residencies with the Canadian Forces Artist Program (2024–2025) and the Whitney Independent Study Program (New York, 2021–2022), and is currently based in Vancouver.
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This event will be held on Zoom—free registration is required in order to receive the event link.
Please note that this event takes place at 12:00 PM (noon) PST / 3:00 PM EST.