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Drawing on a series of recent curatorial projects, curator and writer Milia Xin Bi will reflect on a body of work that explores the material, cultural, and temporal dimensions of data and digital infrastructures. These projects consider how data has moved beyond an abstract computational entity to become a cultural and material condition shaping contemporary life, affecting how we understand memory, infrastructure, and the environments we inhabit.
The talk will then focus on Bi's current exhibition Can Meeple Escape the Neurophoria?, developed during her Curator-in-Residence programme at FACT Liverpool. She will share the research journey behind the project, outlining why tabletop gaming became a conceptual framework for the exhibition, and how our sense of agency is increasingly mediated by intelligent systems, algorithms, and automated infrastructures.
Looking ahead, Milia will also introduce early ideas for her upcoming residency at esea contemporary, which will explore unexpected adaptations, ‘accidents’, forms of agency, and everyday workarounds in our encounters with complex technological systems.
The talk will last approximately 45 minutes and will be followed by a Q&A. Refreshments and an opportunity for informal networking will be provided afterwards.
Booking is essential. Please also consider making a donation to esea contemporary to support our charitable work.
Milia Xin Bi is a curator and writer based in Glossop, UK. Her curatorial practice explores how artistic practices can question the instrumental logic of technology and propose alternative narratives for how technology might be lived with. Her research explores multi-temporalities, manifold materialities, and mediated agency emerging from complex systems.
Milia is currently Curator-in-Residence at FACT Liverpool (2025–2026), where her residency exhibition Can Meeple Escape the Neurophoria? is on view. Alongside this role, she has been an integral part of Chronus Art Center (CAC) since 2017, where she has led and contributed to numerous interdisciplinary projects. She is also the recipient of the Hyundai Blue Prize Art+Tech 2022.