NEW INC and Pioneer Works invite you to a conversation that explores spatial divides throughout time, emerging practices to re-claim dwellings and public areas, and the role of collective imagination in liberation. We’ll hear from Pioneer Works Tech Resident Ariana Faye Allensworth and NEW INC members Ashley Jane Lewis and Eric Moed of oopsa (Office of Open Practice), whose work deals with the urgency of spatial access, historical representation, and how to envision new worlds through the use of data viz, speculative design and monumental sculpture.

This event will include closed captioning. ASL interpretation and CART captioning are available by requests made at least four business days prior to the program.

Ariana Faye Allensworth is a visual artist and researcher based in Brooklyn, NY. Her work builds upon interests in photography, spatial justice, and the politics of the archive. She has over 10 years of experience as a cultural producer and arts administrator, specializing in arts education and social impact strategy. She currently works as a Senior Design Lead at IDEO and has previously held positions at The International Center of Photography, The Center for Cultural Power, Youth Speaks, and Cultural Engagement Lab. Ariana is also a founding member of the New York City chapter of the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project and a Winter 2021 Technology Resident at Pioneer Works.

Ashley Jane Lewis is a new media artist with a focus on speculative design and tech education. Her artistic practice explores black diaspora of the past, present and future through computational and analog mediums including science fiction, networked devices, machine learning, data weaving, food design, bio art and performance. Her award winning work has exhibited in Canada and America, most notably on the White House website during the Obama presidency. As an educator, Ashley has taught more than 3500 young people how to code, landing her on the 2016 Top 100 Black Women to Watch in Canada. She’s helped lower the barrier to entry into creative computing in her work with Dan Shiffman and ml5.org, a “friendly machine learning for the web” platform. Ashley holds a New Media BFA from Ryerson University in Toronto and a Master’s degree from ITP at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. 

Eric Moed (b. 1987, New York, NY) Eric’s work exists at the intersection of art, design and architecture – examining the relationship between history, memory and society. He is an exhibited designer, artist and architect and has completed large-scale public installations in the US and the EU. Moed’s projects have been featured in the New York Times, The International Herald Tribune, Archinect, Architizer, The Huffington Post, Haaretz, NPR and BBC Radio. He holds a Masters in Design Studies from Harvard University Graduate School of Design with a concentration in Art, Design, and the Public Domain (’19) and a Bachelors of Architecture from Pratt Institute (’12). In 2019 Eric was a researcher at the MIT Media Lab’s Poetic Justice Group. In 2020 he co-founded New York-based design studio oopsa aka Office of Open Practice Studio/Agency with Penelope Phylactopolous.