VANESSA RAMOS-VELASQUEZ
Media Artist • Trans/Postdisciplinary Researcher • Lecturer
CORE INTEREST
Socially engaged and decolonial practices in art & research in the axis of artivism-ecology-science-technology-society with studies and collaborative work with Indigenous communities in the Amazonian-Andean worlds.
EDUCATION / RESEARCH
2018–2025 Ph.D. Candidate Media Art, Bauhaus University Weimar. Advisors: Prof. Dr. Alexandra Toland; Prof. Dr. Julia Bee (IfM–Institut für Medienwissenschaft); artistic mentor: Luzia Simons.
2/2015 Master of Arts. Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK). New Media (Practice & Theory). Interdisciplinary Studies in Art & Design, Philosophy of New Media, Cultural History and Theory.
10/2012–2/2015 Humboldt University, Berlin. Research track and colloquia. Helmholtz Zentrum für Kulturtechnik / The interdisciplinary laboratory of the Cluster of Excellence Image-Knowledge-Gestaltung, with Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schäffner. Research lines: The Technical Image, Digital Humanities, Architecture of Knowledge, Materials Science.
9/2012 Humboldt University. KOSMOS Summer University. Participant, Interdisciplinary R&D Group on Urban Mobility, with Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schäffner, Director, Cultural History and Theory Department, and artists Rejane Cantoni & Leo Crescenti.
2/2011–2015 Independent Researcher, Vilém Flusser Archive, UdK Berlin.
2000–2008 New York University, The New School. Continuing Education. Film & Video, Media Licensing.
8/1988–5/1993 Bachelor of Fine Arts. University of Kansas , USA. Fulbright Scholar
8/1987–6/1988 Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. School of Fine Arts. (transferred to the United States)
CERTIFICATIONS
2022 Pre-Texts educational protocol, Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching (HILT), Harvard University
2014 CopyrightX Brasil. Selected participant. Seminar with Prof. William Fisher, Berkman Klein Center, Harvard Law School, in conjunction with UERJ and Instituto de Tecnologia e Sociedade do Rio de Janeiro (ITS Rio).
EXHIBITS | PERFORMANCES | KEYNOTES | TALKS | WORKSHOPS
2025 Upcoming, 30.5 Digital Anthropophagy x Algorithmic Cannibalism! A Lecture-Performance in Two Acts or More. The HKW Program AI (Ancestral Immediacies): The Collective Brain. Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin. https://www.hkw.de/en/programme/ai-the-collective-brain/digital-anthropophagy-x-algorithmic-cannibalism#main
2024 Organiser and discussant. Vilém Flusser Through the Anthropocene and the Anthropocene Through Flusser round table with guest Rodrigo Maltez Novaes at The Anthropocene Campus Latin America. ESDI, Rio de Janeiro.
2023 The Coming Catastrophe and Its Possible Decelerators. Media installation at exhibit ZNE! Zur Nachahmung Empfohlen: Expeditionen in Ästhetik und Nachhaltigkeit. Uferhallen, Berlin Wedding. Artist Talk. With the Best of Intentions. Navigating the colonial and extractive past and present in artistic and academic practice. https://zur-nachahmung-empfohlen.de/en/artist-talk-with-the-best-of-intentions/
2022 Regarding Water Conception and curatorship of group exhibit at Galerie Eigenheim Weimar Disrupted Flows Media installation at Galerie Eigenheim Weimar Dream Collector Art in public places and short film, in collaboration with Diego López, Peruvian play writer and Milena Pereira, Brazilian choreographer.
2020 Invited speaker. Commemorative conference for philosopher Vilém Flusser’s Centennial. Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, postponed indefinitely due to COVID-19 pandemic.
2019 Sisyphus Videoart installation (a collaboration with artist Néle Azevedo). Instituto Martius-Staden, São Paulo, Brazil.
2018 Presenter. From Digital Anthropophagy to the Anthropocene: Cannibalism on Speed, Conference Bites Here and There: Cannibalism across disciplines. Warwick University. Manchester, UK. Presenter. Who Ate Whom? The Amerindian Counter-narrative in the Anthropocene, presented at Symposium Feverish World. University of Vermont, with keynote by Bruno Latour.
Web of Relations Outdoor participatory installation during conference Feverish World. University of Vermont, USA.
2016 Digital Anthropophagy & the Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age. Keynote Speaker at Kultursymposium Weimar The Sharing Game (Teilen und Tauschen). Exchange in Culture and Society, invited by Goethe Institut. https://slideslive.com/38896998/
Invited speaker. Kultursymposium Weimar Session with Frank Hartmann’s presentation Paul Otlet—Zur Frühgeschichte Der Wissensallmende, mediated by Florian Rötzer: http://www.goethe.de/ges/prj/ksw_neu/prg/de15426811.htm
Sisyphus Vide oart Installation (a collaboration with artist Néle Azevedo). Espaço Vitrine. São Paulo, Brazil.
2015 A•LIVE Audiovisual Performances. The Paseo outdoor media arts festival. Taos, New Mexico, USA. Invited Artist funded by the New Mexico Art Commission. http://www.paseotaos.org/#!2015-artists/czr3
A•LIVE Videomicrography & The Art of Seeing. 3-Day Workshop for 26 eighth-grade students of the Taos Charter School, as part of the STEM+Art educational component of The Paseo. Taos, New Mexico, USA.
http://www.stemartslab.com/partners/the-paseo-2015/artist-labs/
Bodenlos_Homo Ludens with accompanying research component as a 20-print series on techno-organic creation of networks. Art exhibit DEVOUR! Social Cannibalism, Political Redefinition and Architecture. KunstkraftWerk, Leipzig, Germany.
2014 The Collaborative Garden Workshop, co-author with Yara Guasque (Brazil). ISEA2014/Dubai, UAE.
http://archives.isea-web.org/?page_id=33766
360 Degrees Sonification of data from tree rings. Keynote Speaker via Skype from Mata Atlântica biome, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to the STEM+Art program at Georgia Institute of Technology, USA.
http://dm.lcc.gatech.edu/~ngaskins3/NSF_Workshop_2014/report.html
2013 Coded Narratives (feat. guest musician A Guy Called Gerald) Interactive participatory performance with audience. Selected artist, world premiere at transmediale/CTM 2013. Haus der Kulturen der Welt, main auditorium (1,000 audience capacity, attended by 750 ticket-holders). Berlin, Germany. http://www.ctm-festival.de/festival13/2013/02/01/programme/event/coded_narratives/
Invited guest. Noosphere Reflections 1: Flusserian Philosophical Flux by Metaflux Lab. SAVVY Contemporary. Berlin.
Video art session and artist talk at Berlin’s seminal platform Scope Sessions for Research, Performance, Design, AV, Architecture / #19 February 21st, 2013. Panke, Berlin.
Discussant. KITTLER_FLUSSER_mediations. A monthly workshop series on Friedrich Kittler & Vilém Flusser.
2013–2011 Discussant. Flusserian Philosophical Flux, Metaflux reading group events organized by Rodrigo Maltez Novaes, archivist, and Claudia Becker, scientific supervisor at Vilém Flusser_Archiv.
2012 A-LIVE Large prints from micrographic video art of the performances A-LIVE. Group Exhibit CHRONOSCOPIE. Kunstraum t27, Berlin.
Antropofagia Digital e o Re-Manifesto Antropofágico para a Era Digital Performance-Lecture at International Congress Vom Begriff zum Bild: Medienkultur nach Vilém Flusser, organized by Michael Hanke, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil; and Steffi Winkler, Freie Universität Berlin.
A-LIVE Videomicrography performance with sound art collaborator Derek Holzer. Basic Electricity, Lichtblick Kino,Berlin.
Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age Ritualistic reading for Tecnomagias Art Residency via telepresence from Berlin. NUVEM HackLab, Mauá, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age Performance. Bergen Art & Design Academy, Norway.
Participant. Conference Media Transatlantic IV: Traffic. University of Paderborn, Germany. With Richard Cavell (UBC, Canada), John Durham Peters (University of Iowa), et. al.
2012–2010 Digital Anthropophagy & the Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age Performance-Lecture. Moscow Biennial 2011; ABCiber, Brazil; Emergeandsee Berlin; ISEA 2011-Istanbul; transmediale 2011: Vilém Flusser Theory Award
Distinction; ISEA 2010-RUHR. See publications for other events.
2011 Discussant. Flusser Seminar. Sandberg Instituut, Amsterdam. Apparatus: The Toy That Simulates Thinking. Discussion of Flusser texts: 1.Imagination, 2.The Photograph as Post-Industrial Object, An Essay on the Ontological Standing of Photographs, 3.How Technoimagination Might Work (from Communicology).
2011–2010 Catch Du Jour short film. FestArte Videoart Festival. Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Roma (MACRO), Ravello LAB, and Forum di Ancona, Italy. 5/2010: Off-Loop Video art Festival, Barcelona.
2011 Video art for Richie Hawtin’s record label Plus-8.
DJ at opening of club Prince Charles with Daniel Haaksman.
2010 VJ/DJ for PREMIÈRE BRASIL Filme des Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival. HKW, Berlin.
Videoart piece at Festival do Minuto. MASP-Museu de Arte de São Paulo. Program Videopoesia Cidades.
2009 Live video art show. The Chelsea Art Museum, New York.
Video art for Diplo and Steve Aoki’s Asian Tour, Club Tango.
DJ/VJ at Beijing Int’l Film Festival closing event at YuGong YiShan. China.
Live video art performance with music artist Schloss Tegal. XIV Prague Industrial Festival, International Meeting of Avantgarde Musicians and Performers. Prague, CZ.
2008 Somnex in Luminem. Author and videoartist of live videodance performance. Co-choreographed with dancers from the New York Metropolitan Opera. NY, USA.
2006–2004 VJ at EYEWASH (Forward Motion Theatre). Monkeytown performance space, New York City.
2005 VJ for the Brazil Premiere Film Festival. Knitting Factory, Nova York.
2005–2000 Long-term VJ residencies in New York City. VOID: Soho video lounge; MUNDIAL: East Village video lounge; The Remote Lounge (the first digital entertainment lounge in NYC).
VJ sets: the Core Club, Cielo, Nublu, SOB’s, Pianos, and Galapagos Art Space, New York City.
VJ sets: Fosfobox, Dama de Ferro, 00 (Zero Zero). Rio de Janeiro.
Video art for night-clubs published by the DVJ Vision series.
DJ sets: Soho Grand, Tribeca Grand.
2003 Support performance as VJ sharing the night with New York synth-punk band Suicide. Knitting Factory, NY.
Video projection/urban intervention show Visions of America on building façades throughout the five boroughs of New York City. Complacent.org July 4th festival.
1993–1995 Live video art performances with Schloss Tegal. Lawrence, KS.
1991 Performing role in Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin/The Promised Land. KS, USA.
TEACHING
2025 Class organizer and round table discussant on energy transition for Prof. Jamie Allen’s Civic Ecologies course for students of New York University, Berlin chapter. Class location: Heizkraftwerk Reuter West, Berlin.
2024 Workshop instructor for various activities during Anthropocene Campus Latin America.
SoSe.2022 Bauhaus.Module: Experimental Filmmaking with Sensory Ethnography, open to all. Media Faculty.
SoSe.2022 Experimental Filmmaking with Handmade Films. Guest lecturer for the class of Nicola Hens. Media Faculty. Bauhaus University Weimar.
WiSe.2021 Bauhaus.Module: Artistic Research as Methodology for Filmmaking, open to all. Art & Design Faculty.
SoSe.2021, WiSe.2021 at Bauhaus. Abstract Writing Workshop offered as Schlüsselqualifikation for Ph.D.s
SoSe.2019 Guest lecturer for the class of Prof. Julia Bee.
2015 Workshop The Art of Seeing Videomicrography, lab sessions in 3 days for 26 eighth-grade students of the Taos Charter School, part of the STEM+Art educational component of The Paseo. New Mexico, USA.
2014 Workshop The Collaborative Garden (with collaborator Yara Guasque). ISEA2014/Dubai, UAE.
2012 Workshop for Master’s students of Prof. Michelle Teran at Bergen Art & Design Academy, Norway.
2012–2000 Teaching video editing and post-production protocols for various global media outlets.
2015 Visual Effects Artist / Diego Velázquez ou le réalisme sauvage (dir. Karim Aïnouz)
2010 Associate Producer, Additional Editor / The Gracies and the Birth of Vale Tudo (dir. Victor Cesar Bota)
2010 Assistent Editor / Fritz Bauer: Tod auf Raten (dir. Ilona Ziok)
2006 Color Grader, Editing Consultant / Quilombo Country (dir. Leonard Abrams)
1995 Producer and Authorer of interactive DVD / A Great Day in Harlem (dir. Jean Bach). Oscar-nominated documentary.
ART & RESEARCH RESIDENCIES
5/2023 Amazonian forest, Acre, Brazil.
5/2022 Amazonian forest, Acre, Brazil.
12/2018–9/2020 Total of 10 months in the Amazonian regions (BR, PE) and Peruvian Andean regions.
PUBLICATIONS (abbreviated)
– Publishing of practice-based Ph.D. project Anthropophagy! Who Is Eating Who? Dissertation, plus an online exhibit of the research archive to be published at ResearchCatalogue.net; and a feature-length artistic documentary. 2025/26
– Mend, Blend, Attend: Advancing Artistic Research. Proceedings of the 13th SAR International Conference on Artistic Research Weimar, Orgs. Alex Toland, Stefanie Schwarz, and Jan Willmann, 2024.
– O Perspectivismo Vertiginoso do Teatro Oficina e O Sonho-Semente de Zé Celso de Um Teatro Por Vir. 2024, Journal of Artistic Research. https://jar-online.net/pt/node/2236
– The Drive Toward the Coming Catastrophe and Its Possible Decelerators. Accompanying article to the media installation The Coming Catastrophe and Its Possible Decelerators. https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2020772/2020773
– Between the individual tortoise shell and the collective malocas, we are nowhere in particular. In: Beyond Bauhaus: New Approaches to Architecture and Design Theory. 6.2020. https://doi.org/10.11588/arthistoricum.658
– Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age: 10th-Year Rendition, a reflective essay. Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal. Special Issue: Cannibalism. Vol.7, Issue 2, 1.2020. https://doi.org/10.31273/eirj.v7i2
– Vasa Journal on Images and Culture #4, Pub. date 25.9.13 http://vjic.org/vjic2/?page_id=2574
– Imagem, imaginação, fantasia: 20 anos sem Vilém Flusser. Organizers: Alice Serra, Rodrigo Duarte e Romero Freitas. ISBN:978-85-66786-03-3 http://www.relicarioedicoes.com/imagem-imaginacao-fantasia-20-anos-sem-vilem-flusser
– Conference catalogue and scientific journals Comunicação e Cultura/Kommunikation & Kultur, organized by the international Congress Vom Begriff zum Bild: Medienkultur nach Vilém Flusser, UFRN, Brazil and Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. ISBN 978-3-8288-3272-5, www.tectum-verlag.de Book review by Axel Roderich Werner (Bochum):
– Intercreate Research Center/Intercreate.org (Art, Science, Technology and Cultural Bridging) – SCANZ 2013 3rd Nature International Conference: https://www.intercreate.org/scanz2013digital-anthropophagy/
– Extensively referenced in Carolyn Guertin’s book Digital Prohibition: Piracy and Authorship in New Media Art. Imprint: Continuum. Pub. date: 26.4. 2012. ISBN: 9781441131904
– Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age (ENG, PT) performances documented on exhibit catalogue/art book Perpendicular Casa e Rua, a project supported by Brazil Ministry of Culture. Imprint: ICC. Pub. date: 31.3.2012 ISBN 978-85-61659-23-3
– Writer for Goethe Institut blog, 2012. URLs no longer active.
– ISEA2012/Albuquerque: http://socialmedia.hpc.unm.edu/isea2012/sites/default/files/ISEA2012_confproceedings_WEB.pdf
– ISEA2011/Istanbul: http://isea2011.sabanciuniv.edu/paper/digital-anthropophagy-and-anthropophagic-re-manifesto-digital-age
– ISEA2010/RUHR: published as abstract in conference catalogue.
AWARDS / HONORS / GRANTS & SCHOLARSHIPS
2023 Kreativfonds, Bauhaus University Weimar.
10-12/2020 DAAD Teilstipendium/Social Engagement Prize, Bauhaus University Weimar.
2018 Travel grants in the EU from the Equal Opportunity Office at the Bauhaus University Weimar.
2015 Freundeskreis der Universität der Künste Berlin | Karl-Hofer Gesellschaft e.V
2011 ECF – Step Beyond Travel Grant for ISEA2011 / From Berlin to Istanbul.
2011 Vilém Flusser Theory Award Distinction with the work Digital Anthropophagy and the Anthropophagic Re-Manifesto for the Digital Age. Transmediale Festival, Berlin, Germany.
1992 F. Mildred Law Scholarship from The Kansas University Endowment Association, USA.
1988–1993 Fulbright Scholarship received via the International Institute of Education program, USA.
PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES CONCURRENT WITH ART & RESEARCH
2024 Co-creator of FORUM (LinkingDebate.com), a dialogue assembly platform for constructive discussion weaving Activism, Citizenship, Climate, Health, Human Rights, Scholarship and Technology.
2024 Expert evaluator for the New European Bauhaus/NEB Prizes 2024.
2023 Jury member and chair, New European Bauhaus/NEB Prizes 2023.
2020 Facilitator for the creation of Instituto Arara Encantada, Acre, Brazil.
2017 Co-Founder. Deutsches Migrationsmuseum: https://www.deutschesmigrationsmuseum.de/
1990–1993 Theater technician, University of Kansas.
