Cultural Entrepreneur. AI TechArtist. Curator. Researcher.
"In our AI-driven future, art and research weave soul into innovation, the very fabric of possibility."
Archana uniquely blends art and activism to build a vibrant innovation culture, reshape public perceptions of creativity, and nurture a global network of creators committed to AI and techart for socio-environmental change.
She has a deep love of documentation and creating public awareness on neighbourhood socio-cultural heritage, and many of her projects over the last two decades do so using a combination of hi and low tech with social research, design and participatory art processes.
Archana formerly worked at Microsoft Research India in Design Research and Advanced Prototyping and holds 3 global technology patents. She holds a Bachelors in Painting and a Masters in Art History from CKP and a Masters in Animation from NID. She is a Clore & Chevening 2017 Fellow and an ATSA 2010 Fellow. She is a TechStars Founder and a Blume Founder. Archana is an Accredited Coach from Relational Dynamics First, UK. She has a Master Class Certificate in Curating Contemporary Arts, Royal College of Arts, UK.
Her work has received a Public Arts Grant from the India Foundation for the Arts, British Council's Digital Arts Grant, Facebook Developers Community Challenge Prize amongst others. She was an Artist-in-Residence at Kanoria Center for the Arts. She won the German Language Artists Scholarship at Goethe Institut, Bangalore.
About
In the era of AI, curation in the cultural sector remains essential for navigating information overload, tailoring experiences, providing context, facilitating discoverability, addressing ethical concerns, building community, and supporting artists and cultivating the cultural landscape.
Curate Culture
Techart is a wide open frontier for creative innovation, where artists craft interactivity, bridge disciplines, and collaborate across borders. It's the loom where artists weave a vivid tapestry, a reflection of our era's spirit, and a gateway to manifesting a better future.
Make TechArt
Gen AI transforms the arts and cultural sector by revolutionizing creation, access, collaboration, and preservation, making it an essential and transformative force in the global cultural landscape.
Explore Gen AI
Art festivals, conferences, and exhibitions are the vibrant canvases for techarts to blossom. They also provide both the showcase and the pulpit to reach and connect with diverse groups of people in our efforts to move the needle for positive change on critical issues of our times.
Gather & Show
Community building is critical to human connection, sparking engagement, inclusivity, and collaboration. Together, we educate, preserve, and amplify the arts, offering context, ethical guidance, and unwavering support to culture makers. As technology leapfrogs us into the vast unknown, these human networks hold and ground us.
Build Community
Focus Areas
Featured Work
BeFantastic.in
BeFantastic BeFantastic is a TechArt platform birthed from the experiences of Jaaga.in a social experiment that started in 2009. BeFantastic continues the ethos of innovation in techarts, with a deep focus on community. Its flagship festival FutureFantastic.in is a heady mix of AI-enabled artworks, dialogues, workshops and performances to amplify a global response to our shared climate emergency in the belief that we can manifest a radical, open and optimistic future as activated global citizens. Together.
Creative Practice
Work from Archana's archives spanning the last two decades at the cusp of public, tech arts and research.
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Poetry Across Borders – live shared international poetry performance events
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Samuha – A Site & Time Specific Artist Platform
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CitySignals – A Sonic-Video Public Art Project
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The Manjunauts – A Sci-Fi Experimental Electronica Art Band
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Neighbourhood Diaries – Oral histories of Bangalore neighbourhoods
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Hampi Crafts – Documenting Living Crafts. Supported by Crafts Council & Gov India, Science & Technology Dept.
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India Digital Heritage Project – A Microsoft Research Pilot for a Heritage Narratives platform
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We Are Here – Phone based urban excursions into the city
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Urban Avantgarde – Art On the Streets of Malleswaram
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Bangalore City Project – Connecting the City through Culture
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Malleswaram Accessibility Project – Participatory Neighbourhood Accessibility
