Ken Okiishi

In his works, Ken Okiishi explores complex states of mind and emotion by engaging with the vocabulary of the media he employs, while simultaneously subjecting them to critical scrutiny. His works navigate the tension between matter and memory, perception and action, networks of images, and media systems. In doing so, he creates moments in which language and images drift apart, giving rise to deliberate disruptions that open up new spaces for perception. Central to his work is his interest in the shifting relationships between digital image space and physical existence, as well as in the question of how the body and psyche adapt to a reality increasingly shaped by technological and visual artifacts.

In the work 25 Jan 2025, Okiishi superimposes a sequence of digital images on a screen with gestural brushstrokes. The images are from a screen recording of videos that appeared in Okiishi’s Instagram search window, a panel that appears with AI-algorithmically optimized recommendations, something Okiishi has referred to as ​“an abject unconscious.” As the images shift — from a portrait of Luigi Mangione, an Ivy League graduate accused of murdering the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, to lesser-known figures (many generated with AI) and various close-ups — a visual structure emerges in which the brushstrokes painted onto the screen appear at times more legible, at times less so. The interplay of the brushstrokes simulates a form of touch that repeats and reverberates. In this way, Okiishi succeeds in gesturally articulating and making visible the character and representational nature of digital data. New York artist and writer Felix Bernstein describes these works as a wafer-thin membrane that lies over the image like a second skin. In his conception, the screen becomes a textured surface that is simultaneously addressed and withdrawn, thereby bringing about an approach to an ultimately unattainable image. At the same time, the boundary between image and medium becomes unstable, making it impossible to determine unequivocally whether the painterly trace is situated within or on the surface of the digital image space. The interplay of different temporalities and media levels gives rise to a structure in which physical gestures and data-driven processes intertwine, and perception itself becomes an experience of a circular, feedback-driven process.

Ken Okiishi’s works reveal how closely perception and meaning are tied to media processes that cannot be stabilized, but instead are constantly shifting and reorganizing themselves. His works create deliberate disruptions within systems of images and signs, making it clear that seeing and understanding are not immediate acts, but are mediated by structures that influence and continuously modify one another. Subjectivity and meaning arise only within such media-mediated loops, in which perception, interpretation, and reaction interlock, while remaining fundamentally unstable and subject to change at any time.

25 jan. 2025, 2025
Acrylic paint on mylar, monitor, .mov File (color, silent)
121,9 × 68,6 × 9,5 cm
Courtesy Reena Spaulings Fine Art, New York and Pilar Corrias, London