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Thin Air

Thin Air

‘Hands down the coolest thing I have ever seen’
London Live

'A must-see'
It's Nice That

★★★★
Culture Whisperer

★★★★
Londonist

Thin Air is now closed.

Art at the boundaries of light sound and space.

Thin Air explored the hidden complexities that shape the world we live in. Using digital technology and large-scale installation, international artists transformed the spaces of the Beams until 4th June 2023.

Featuring work by contemporary artists including 404.zero, James Clar, Robert Henke, Kimchi and Chips with Rosa Menkman, Matthew Schreiber, S E T U P and UCLA Arts Conditional Studio.

Key information

Thin Air is now closed.

17 March - 4 June 2023.

Open Thursday to Sunday.

Address
The Beams, Factory Rd, London E16 2HB

London City Airport (DLR) is a short distance away.

By Bus
330, 473 & 474 all stop near the venue

The experience

‘Colossal immersive light show’
Secret London

‘Rife with architectural design and optical effects, it’s a must-see. ‘
10 Magazine

‘A world to step into’
Metal Mag

Thin Air’s opening chapter is a transformative journey through the cavernous spaces of Beams.

Taking advantage of over 55,000 square feet of vast interconnecting environments, the exhibition brings together works by seven global contemporary artists and collectives and explores the boundaries between art and technology, working with light, atmospherics, sound and experimental new media.

The artists

404.zero

404.zero is a collaboration between the artists Kristina Karpysheva and Alexandr Letsius. The duo specialises in real-time, generative, and code-based art, which is presented in large-scale installations, performance and music. They combine noise with randomised algorithms to stimulate visceral and awe-inspiring reactions. Through their use of digital technology, they question the power structures of the Anthropocene and global politics, revealing them as invisible yet impregnable environments of the contemporary condition.

The duo’s work has been shown at venues around the world, including Prague, Mexico City, Seoul, Lima, San Francisco and in New York’s Times Square. They have shown in festivals and exhibitions including MUTEK, Gamma Festival, Electric Castle, Japan Media Arts Festival and Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).
404.zero is a collaboration between the artists Kristina Karpysheva and Alexandr Letsius. The duo specialises in real-time, generative, and code-based art, which is presented in large-scale installations, performance and music. They combine noise with randomised algorithms to stimulate visceral and awe-inspiring reactions. Through their use of digital technology, they question the power structures of the Anthropocene and global politics, revealing them as invisible yet impregnable environments of the contemporary condition.

The duo’s work has been shown at venues around the world, including Prague, Mexico City, Seoul, Lima, San Francisco and in New York’s Times Square. They have shown in festivals and exhibitions including MUTEK, Gamma Festival, Electric Castle, Japan Media Arts Festival and Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

James Clar

James Clar is an artist who works with light and technology. He is interested in how new media technologies shape human behaviour. Many of his works play with perception using sculptural elements that appear to warp between dimensions, using a wide range of materials and systems, such as multi-channel video installations, lasers, LEDs, and 3D printed elements. He combines these elements to create complex narratives that reference mythology and global history, while questioning our engagement with digital culture.

Clar’s work has been included in exhibitions at Glucksman Museum, Dublin, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, Pera Museum, Istanbul, Sam Francis Museum and MACBA, Barcelona and SeMA, Seoul, and the Parasol Unit Foundation for Contemporary Art, London.
James Clar is an artist who works with light and technology. He is interested in how new media technologies shape human behaviour. Many of his works play with perception using sculptural elements that appear to warp between dimensions, using a wide range of materials and systems, such as multi-channel video installations, lasers, LEDs, and 3D printed elements. He combines these elements to create complex narratives that reference mythology and global history, while questioning our engagement with digital culture.

Clar’s work has been included in exhibitions at Glucksman Museum, Dublin, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, Pera Museum, Istanbul, Sam Francis Museum and MACBA, Barcelona and SeMA, Seoul, and the Parasol Unit Foundation for Contemporary Art, London.

Kimchi and Chips with Rosa Menkman

Kimchi and Chips is a Seoul-based art collective founded in 2009 by Mimi Son and Elliot Woods. Their large-scale installations explore the intersection of art, science and philosophy. Rather than separating these disciplines, the duo combine Buddhist philosophy with computer coding, electromagnetics and optical systems. Son and Elliot are recognised as pioneers in volumetric imagery and advanced 3D projection. As well as presenting their ideas through their installations, they share them as open-source software that are used by other creative practitioners and popular software toolkits.

Kimchi and Chips have presented their work at the National Museum of Contemporary Art (MMCA Korea), ZKM Center for Art and Media, Somerset House, Ars Electronica, ACC Gwangju, Zeche Zollverein, SxSW and Resonate Festival.

Rosa Menkman is a Dutch artist and researcher interested in the possibility of the glitch. Defined as a noise artefact that results from an accident in either digital or analogue media, glitches can provide insight into the otherwise obscure alchemy of media resolutions. Menkman is the author of Glitch Moment/um (2011), Beyond Resolution (2020) and recently edited the Im/Possible images reader (2023). In 2019 she was awarded the Collide Arts at CERN Award. Menkman's narrative is based on research she did at the NeMe Arts Centre, Cyprus during her European Media Art Platform residency.
Kimchi and Chips is a Seoul-based art collective founded in 2009 by Mimi Son and Elliot Woods. Their large-scale installations explore the intersection of art, science and philosophy. Rather than separating these disciplines, the duo combine Buddhist philosophy with computer coding, electromagnetics and optical systems. Son and Elliot are recognised as pioneers in volumetric imagery and advanced 3D projection. As well as presenting their ideas through their installations, they share them as open-source software that are used by other creative practitioners and popular software toolkits.

Kimchi and Chips have presented their work at the National Museum of Contemporary Art (MMCA Korea), ZKM Center for Art and Media, Somerset House, Ars Electronica, ACC Gwangju, Zeche Zollverein, SxSW and Resonate Festival.

Rosa Menkman is a Dutch artist and researcher interested in the possibility of the glitch. Defined as a noise artefact that results from an accident in either digital or analogue media, glitches can provide insight into the otherwise obscure alchemy of media resolutions. Menkman is the author of Glitch Moment/um (2011), Beyond Resolution (2020) and recently edited the Im/Possible images reader (2023). In 2019 she was awarded the Collide Arts at CERN Award. Menkman's narrative is based on research she did at the NeMe Arts Centre, Cyprus during her European Media Art Platform residency.

Robert Henke

Robert Henke is a digital artist who works with algorithmically generated images, laser installations and early personal computer hardware. A co-creator of the cult music software Ableton Live, Henke has redefined the way we create and experience electronic music. Inspired by radical club culture, his own electronic music project Monolake was at the heart of the new electronic music scene emerging in Berlin after the fall of the Wall in 1989.

Henke’s installations, performances and concerts have been presented at Tate Modern, London, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, MoMA PS1, New York, MUDAM, Luxembourg, MAK. Vienna, Palazzo Grassi, Venice, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Australia, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, STRP Biennale in Eindhoven, and at festivals including Unsound, CTM, MUTEK, Sonar and New Forms Festival.
Robert Henke is a digital artist who works with algorithmically generated images, laser installations and early personal computer hardware. A co-creator of the cult music software Ableton Live, Henke has redefined the way we create and experience electronic music. Inspired by radical club culture, his own electronic music project Monolake was at the heart of the new electronic music scene emerging in Berlin after the fall of the Wall in 1989.

Henke’s installations, performances and concerts have been presented at Tate Modern, London, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, MoMA PS1, New York, MUDAM, Luxembourg, MAK. Vienna, Palazzo Grassi, Venice, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Australia, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, STRP Biennale in Eindhoven, and at festivals including Unsound, CTM, MUTEK, Sonar and New Forms Festival.

S E T U P

S E T U P is an acclaimed international studio merging the lines between multimedia art, lighting & stage design, and performance programming. The studio was founded by Znamensky Dmitry, Novikov Stepan, Zmunchila Pavel and Kochnev Anton in 2018. The team is driven by their mission to explore the expressive opportunities provided by new digital technologies. Working with light, programming and sculpture, the group creates installations that sharpen physical perception. They are especially interested in image and spatial distortion, using high-tech media to transform the spaces they work in.

S E T U P works at the intersection between contemporary art and lighting design. Their multimedia practice has seen them work with musicians including Skrillex and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.
S E T U P is an acclaimed international studio merging the lines between multimedia art, lighting & stage design, and performance programming. The studio was founded by Znamensky Dmitry, Novikov Stepan, Zmunchila Pavel and Kochnev Anton in 2018. The team is driven by their mission to explore the expressive opportunities provided by new digital technologies. Working with light, programming and sculpture, the group creates installations that sharpen physical perception. They are especially interested in image and spatial distortion, using high-tech media to transform the spaces they work in.

S E T U P works at the intersection between contemporary art and lighting design. Their multimedia practice has seen them work with musicians including Skrillex and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

Matthew Schreiber

Schreiber is a multi-disciplinary artist best known for his large-scale laser light sculptures. Visitors are often invited to enter the environments he creates, and interact physically with his work. Interested in how physics, technology and perception can alter our experience of the world, he reimagines light and space to explore unseen forces. Recurring subjects within Schreiber's work include novelty, the occult, and spectacle.

Schreiber has exhibited internationally, with solo exhibitions at Cornell University and the NSU Art Museum in Fort Lauderdale. His work has been included in group exhibitions at MIT Museum in Cambridge, MA, the Perez Art Museum in Miami, and Galerie Almine Rech in Paris.
Schreiber is a multi-disciplinary artist best known for his large-scale laser light sculptures. Visitors are often invited to enter the environments he creates, and interact physically with his work. Interested in how physics, technology and perception can alter our experience of the world, he reimagines light and space to explore unseen forces. Recurring subjects within Schreiber's work include novelty, the occult, and spectacle.

Schreiber has exhibited internationally, with solo exhibitions at Cornell University and the NSU Art Museum in Fort Lauderdale. His work has been included in group exhibitions at MIT Museum in Cambridge, MA, the Perez Art Museum in Miami, and Galerie Almine Rech in Paris.

UCLA Arts Conditional Studio in collaboration with Goldsmiths, University of London

The UCLA Arts Conditional Studio is an arts collective composed of researchers and students within the School of the Arts and Architecture at the University of California Los Angeles. The studio aims to address the technological, political, social, and artistic consequences of computation by bringing together practitioners to teach and learn, collaborate and comprehend, use and misuse the technology that surrounds us. Their work creates a playful space for participants to engage algorithms common in computation and computer graphics.

The UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture was founded in 1939 as a centre for interdisciplinary art in Los Angeles. Notable alumni include John Baldessari, Mary Kelly and Paul McCarthy.
The UCLA Arts Conditional Studio is an arts collective composed of researchers and students within the School of the Arts and Architecture at the University of California Los Angeles. The studio aims to address the technological, political, social, and artistic consequences of computation by bringing together practitioners to teach and learn, collaborate and comprehend, use and misuse the technology that surrounds us. Their work creates a playful space for participants to engage algorithms common in computation and computer graphics.

The UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture was founded in 1939 as a centre for interdisciplinary art in Los Angeles. Notable alumni include John Baldessari, Mary Kelly and Paul McCarthy.

Ticketing information

We recommend booking a ticket in advance of your visit to avoid missing out on the day. Our tickets are timed so that our spaces are not too busy.

Please note that the venue closes 60 minutes after the last available time slot. Opening times can be found on our website.

Entry for children 3y/o and under is free, but you will still need a ticket.

Off-peak tickets are valid on weekdays before 5pm, excluding bank holidays.

Some of the installations feature extremely dark rooms, strobe lights & loud sounds (up to 98db), so we wouldn’t recommend the exhibition for children aged 6 and under.

Younger children are welcome at the discretion of parents and carers, but we recommend the use of ear defenders which will be available for those that require it onsite.

Ticket types

Adult Early Bird (tickets booked at least 14 days in advance of visit) – £17

Adult peak – £25
Adult off-peak – £20
Concession (students with valid ID, over 65s, NHS staff) – £17
Child (4-16, only bookable with an adult ticket) – £10
Carers – free, only in conjunction with an adult or child ticket purchase

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