UNLOCKED

In this episode of Unlocked, we speak with Chris Maestas (0009), a Los Angeles–based artist whose practice bridges AI, digital systems, and visual culture. He reflects on his early days in street culture, his entry into crypto and NFTs, and how these worlds naturally converged in his work. We discuss authorship, anonymity, and the evolution from illustrative to photorealistic outputs, as well as his ongoing exploration of “urban fabric” as a visual language rooted in memory and identity. Chris also shares his thoughts on community in Web3, the importance of participation, and why the future of digital art still needs its own direction.

In this episode of Unlocked, we speak with Elena Carbajal from Onkaos (Solo Contemporary) in Madrid, a platform working at the intersection of digital art, AI, and research. With a background in philosophy and media theory, she shares how she entered the digital art ecosystem and what it means to support artists working with code and generative systems. We discuss why digital art cannot simply replicate traditional gallery models, the challenge of exhibiting code-based works in physical spaces, and the urgency of building new protocols for production, collecting, and conservation. Elena also introduces the Solo AI Award and Onkaos’ role in connecting art, research, and digital culture.

In this episode of Unlocked, we speak with Mexican photographer and artist Alejandro Cartagena about the evolution of photography, from analog to digital and now into the age of artificial intelligence. Drawing on over two decades of practice, he reflects on the city as a force shaping identity, the role of archives and reproduction, and why AI marks a critical moment of transformation rather than the death of the medium. We also discuss Fellowship, the platform he co-founded to rethink photography, digital art, and collecting.

A deep dive into the evolution of generative art with curator and entrepreneur Sofia Garcia, founder of ArtXCode. From her unexpected path into creative coding to reshaping how artists are represented, Sofia reveals how digital art is challenging the traditional market. We explore the rise of agency-model support for artists, collector dynamics, and CodeArt - the initiative empowering young girls to create with technology. An inspiring look at the present and future of digital culture.

In this episode of Unlocked, artist Cezar Mocan explores how digital art can dissect systems of control. Speaking with Delfina Sena, he unpacks the politics of game engines, the aesthetics of AI, and how emotional resonance and poetic slowness can interrupt dominant technological narratives.

Curator and advisor Marlene Corbun shares what it means to act as a true mediator in today’s art world - guiding artists in the creative process, educating collectors over time, and building bridges between traditional institutions and emerging Web3 practices. With over a decade of experience, from White Cube and Christie’s to her current role as Head Curator at laCollection, Marlene reflects on how digital and physical art are not in opposition, but in dialogue. Her practice is a rare mix of care, precision, and vision for what contemporary collecting can become.

Humans wanting to play God: The machine artist Botto produces 7,000 works a week, challenging traditional notions of authorship, creativity, and agency. But it doesn’t work alone—its evolution and output are guided by a global community that votes on which final pieces are worthy of becoming art. Simon Hudson, who oversees the strategic direction of the project, explains how Botto is a microcosm of the global debate on AI governance.

Curator, art collector, and co-founder of MONO—a Tunis-based micro-gallery championing digital art—Kenza Zouari discusses AI's transformative power, its biases, and its potential to reshape creative expression. She shares her work in elevating underrepresented voices and her latest curatorial project for Janou Tunis, featuring Rima Hassan's photographs of Palestinian refugees. In “Fragments of Home,” Kenza explores various AI narratives to question how we consume, process, and share stories of displacement in our digital age.

Artists Liaison at Unit London, Alice Fry builds bridges between artists and collectors and helps to transform great ideas of the digital realm into palpable exhibitions of the physical world.

She is among the Top 20 inspiring women who manages extensive exhibitions, cultural projects, and art fairs between the UK and the Middle East. He directs The Media Majlis museum in Doha and manages some of the most celebrated international cultural projects, strategic alliances, audience development and stakeholder initiatives. Auronda Scalera and Alfredo Cramerotti make a nearly perfect curatorial duo, covering 20 hours of work per day and omnipresent in the physical and digital worlds.

What makes one artist an artist? Can AI create autonomous art? Such questions drive the Botto Project, an engine that creates over 4000 unique images every week, all untouched by human hands. As founder of Elevenyellow, Selo was part of the founding team of this artist/robot. The Spanish collector is also part of Colección Solo, a private contemporary art collection based in Madrid.

Posthumanism? Postgenderism? What do all these 'post' concepts actually mean? In her exhibitions, Alice Scope discusses the future of humans and how technology might help us build a more just society. For her, we can push our imagination to create better worlds and not recreate our mistakes. Learn with Ukrainian art curator and researcher Alice Scope, currently working with Vellum LA, and Serpentine Arts Technologies.

Spanish digital creator, designer, and curator Diego Iglesias Gomez runs one-of-a-kind projects linking architecture to digital technologies. In the second episode of Unlocked, he discusses with Delfina Sena about his out-of-the-box Hyper Studio, as well as Madrid’s Urban Digital Arts Festival. His critical mind -"The majority of the NFT world is white, heteronormative and male," he says -, led him to create projects which question and propose new patterns of behaviour in the digital space.