Flora Rearing Agricultural Network (F.R.A.N.) is a project exploring plant and machine co-naturality.
The first iteration of F.R.A.N. is a performance and exhibition featuring the creation of a speculative blueprint for a new robotic network connected to nature.
Created during the first quarantine of COVID-19 in 2020
A backdrop of digital flora is linked to the artist's brainwave data, each flux in alpha-state seeding of new formations of sepals, petals, and leaves.
The performance and exhibition is an initial introduction to the physical construction of F.R.A.N., a networked robotic system.
The network imagines new symbiotic arragements between humans, machines and ecologies.
植物花卉培育网络是一个探索植物与机器共生的项目。
F.R.A.N.的第一次迭代 是一项表演，旨在为与自然界连接的新机器人网络创建投机蓝图。 在2020年COVID-19第一次隔离期间创建
数字植物群的背景与艺术家的脑电波数据相关联，新的萼片，花瓣和叶子形成的阿尔法状态种子中的每一种变化。
该性能是对F.R.A.N.物理结构的初步介绍，F.R.A.N。是将于2021年建成的网络化机器人系统。
该网络设想了人类，机器和生态之间的新共生关系。
[n]ow we’re spawning a different kind of mutation, because we’re able to reconceive ourselves virally and instantly put that morphed and evolving regeneration into the world specifically so that it can be adapted and changed. So, where does that mutation leave us?
Is our sense of presence, and who we are, an appendage to how we are perceived?
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EXHIBITIONS
2022 🇯🇵 FLORA REARING AGRICULTURAL NETWORK: LIVE IN TOKYO, Line Cube Theatre, Tokyo
2022 
THE IMITATION GAME, Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver
2021 🇺🇸 THIN AS THORNS, IN THESE THOUGHTS IN US, Honor Fraser Gallery, Los Angeles
2020 
IN THE NAME OF FLOWER, Pearl Art Museum, Shanghai
2020 
GÖTZENDÄMMERUNG, Haus der Kunst, Munich
2020 
FLORA REARING AGRICULTURAL NETWORK, Centre of Contemporary Culture of Barcelona, Barcelona
2020 
RE:MEMORY, Sørlandets Kunstmuseum, Norway
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CREDITS
Concept by Sougwen Chung
Robotics & Visual Direction: Sougwen Chung
EEG Visualization: Sougwen Chung
Musical Score: Chris Leung
EMF/EEG Sound Composition: Wesley Goatley
Lead Producer: Haruka Wang
Production: Scilicet
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READING LIST
Hui, Yuk. Machines and Ecology, Angelaki Journal, 2020.
Giannachi, et al. Archaeologies of Presence: Art, Performance and the Persistence of Being. Routledge, 2012.
Rogoff, Irit. “Becoming Research.” The Contemporary Journal, 12 Oct. 2019,thecontemporaryjournal.org/issues/criticalpedagogies/becoming-research.
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works by sougwen
GENESIS (2024)what becomes of the human hand?
Assembly Lines (2022)a painting performance with a robotic swarm connected to the flow of a city
Mutations of Presence (2021)Exploring spectrality through sequencing bio-feedback to a machine
F.R.A.N. Flora Rearing Agricultural Network (2020)exploring machine and flora as part of a sympoietic, self-supporting networked system with human as gardener.
Ecologies Of Becoming WithProject type
Exquisite Corpus (2019)a performance installation exploring human, machine, and ecological bodies
Omnia per Omnia (2018)a painting performance with a robotic swarm connected to the flow of a city
Into The Light (2019)an audiovisual AR installation
Artefacts (2019)a human and machine collaborative drawing
Drawing Operations (2018)a human and machine collaborative duet
Drawing Operations (2018)soon...
Drawing Operations (2017)a human & machine drawing collaboration involving memory.
Drawing Operations (2015)a human & robot drawing collaboration involving mimicry
Chiaroscuro (2013)a spatial interplay of light and shadow as an immersive installation
Preparatory Gestures (2017)a series of sculpture studies in VR
Mycelia (2018)a series of sculptures inspired by bio-inspired cognition
Ecdysis (2013)a study in performative architecture
High Tide (Étude Op. 2, No. 4)a painting exploring the dynamics of change
The Limitless, The Absolute (2017)a painting inspired by the 八卦 Trigrams of the IChing
Cardia (2012)a short film depicting a transgression from interior to exterior
Apolysis (2014)a short film in collaboration with Clint Mansell
Untitled (Étude Op. 1, No. 1-4)a series of drawings exploring synesthesia
Chiaro Oscuro Prototypesa series of form studies with paper
Topographies (2015)a series of paintings inspired by nature and flow states
Dénouement (Recurrent fevers of unknown origin)
