About

Distant.Gallery is a (non-profit) foundation and online platform where people can come together informally, and meet online. It is constructed in such a way that it respects users' data, does not store or resell it, and does not play visitors off against each other through likes and algorithms. This capacity for social connection, an alternative to “Big Tech” built for a cultural landscape, is the platform's strength. We engage with a variety of communities involved in digital and networked art, with an emphasis on bringing groups together that would not necessarily be able to find each other, nor interact in the Western-dominated art world. Building professional and creative relationships cannot be reserved exclusively for those privileged enough to fly from artfair to biennial, have a nanny, or happen to be born in a particular place. distant.gallery provides online spaces for artists, in an equal non-commercial context where independence and online privacy is guaranteed.

International and local at the same time, it creates the opportunity to discover artists and exhibitions that one would usually never be able to see, either because they are happening in places that are too far from home, or lack the immediate resources to be staged in a physical realm. Visitors get the chance to see shows from all over the world - such as Taiwan, Nairobi, Los Angeles, Mexico City, or Amsterdam - without having to cross borders. The online gallery functions in such a way that visitors of an exhibition can meet each other and start a conversation without having to plan anything, whilst touring the space together. The encounters unfold just as they would in the physical world; when two (or more) users stand in front of the same artwork on distant.gallery, an audio connection is made using the same technology as most online meetings, but with space for intuitive or serendipitous interaction.

There are many initiatives, institutions, platforms, and collectives worldwide that are committed to encouraging artistic expression in their local, social, cultural, and geographic environments. It is especially pertinent in a time when the importance of (cultural) identity, the re-evaluation of perspective, and the ongoing awareness of new and post-colonial ways of working become ever urgent - it is essential that these organizations continue to be supported and do not operate alone. In order to flourish we need conversations with peers and the exchange of ideas. Doing so on an international stage is a route towards irrefutably establishing and deepening various voices and narratives. In the relatively short period of time that distant.gallery has been operating, we have already worked with many artists and curators for whom the digital world is the only way to communicate their work and reality. Some have fled, others would never be able to show their work in their home countries for political reasons. They find each other on distant.gallery - a network is building. And once a connection has been made it cannot be undone.

Do you have a project proposal? Please don’t hesitate to reach out to admin@distant.gallery

Network

The team of distant.gallery has worked together with a roster of various organizations such as Contemporary&, Internet Freedom Foundation, LIMA, Videotage HK, Eyebeam, Upstream, Office Impart, Pioneer Works, HEK Basel, SKD Dresden, ZKM Karlsruhe, Ocean Archive, and Hyundai Artlabs.

Artists who have exhibited on distant.gallery in solo and group shows include Isaac Kariuki, Lawrence Lek, Lorna Mills, Yehwan Song, Petra Cortright, and Sam Lavigne, amongst many, many, others. For a full overview of past projects, please see our archive

“I was first very reluctant to use this platform, because part of me is a really traditional academic who likes to write texts, but this has really opened my eyes. I realized we can present new ideas, for this we can use Zoom, we can use Google Docs, we can publish a letter in a newspaper, but the communication aspect is completely different. (...) Hopefully, we can chat with one another, this is really amazing. I will use this platform for my classes.” - Dr. Lev Manovich

Distant.Gallery has received funding from the Mondriaan Fund, the Cultuurfonds, Creative Industries Fund NL and Cultuurloket DigitALL.

Organizations and projects we have partnered with:

Aksioma Institute for Contemporary Art, Casa del Lago UNAM, Cashmere Radio, Chelouche Gallery, Chinatown Soup, CLOT Magazine, Connected Art Platform, Contemporary And (C&), DAHproject, Electric Artefacts, Futura Tropica, Hivemind DAO, Hong-gah Museum, Institute of Network Cultures, Internet Freedom Foundation, LIMA, The Mythical Institution, Off Site Project, ODRA, Pioneer Works, Pop Post Poetics, TERREMOTO, TextielMuseum Tilburg, TRANSFER Gallery, Valiz, Videotage, VUNU Gallery, and V2_.

Team

Director - Constant Dullaart
Constant Dullaart (NL, 1979) lives and works between Amsterdam and Berlin. Exploring how social and cultural values reverberate in tools and technology, Dullaart creates works to emphasize an enjoyable friction between old and new, manual and automated, online and offline, real and not. He deconstructs and analyzes the specific human circumstances under which technological instruments are created, and how this influences the way the instruments are consequently used. Dullaart investigates these processes via the creation of his own ‘artisanal’ social media platform common.garden. Revisiting his research into neural networks, he probes how phenomena like glossolalia and apohenia can create a bridge between person and technology. Dullaart is professor Networked Materialities at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Nürnberg.

Curator - Nina Lissone
Nina Lissone (NL/SP, 1995) is a curator and writer working chiefly with topics of counter-cultures and subversion within the digital realm, whose interests revolve around disembodied context and narrative-building. She has contributed as a curator to shows at ASC Project Space, the Digital Art Observatory and the Window Gallery at Central Saint Martins. Her writings have been published by Vice, i-D and Village Underground, amongst others.

Creative Developer - Ties van Asseldonk
Ties van Asseldonk (NL, 1998) is a developer, artist & maker. Working in both the digital and the physical world, he usually collaborates with other artists, creating unique objects, websites and digital experiences. Most of his current work is as a web developer, having worked on different hand-crafted websites, including working together with Constant Dullaart on common.garden since the start of the project in early 2020. Ties graduated from ArtEZ University of the Arts in 2020 with a Bachelor of Arts in Interaction Design.

JOIN US NOVEMBER 1ST TO 9TH

distant.gallery presents its first ever festival, in partnership with cultural institutions navigating the pressures of austerity, displacement, and precarity - realities they not only address but increasingly endure. Set against a shifting media landscape shaped by algorithmic amplification, social media virality, and the rise of populist and fascist ideologies, the festival interrogates the role of culture in an age of blurred realities and politicized information.

Through exhibitions, public dialogues, and community-led initiatives, the program highlights how institutions and artists alike strive to sustain cultural expression amid unstable infrastructures and contested narratives. It asks how identity, memory, and tradition can persist - and evolve - when both the physical and digital realms are co-opted, collapsed, or rendered hyperreal. This festival is a call to examine not just what we preserve, but how we continue to do so under intensifying socio-political and economic strain.

With: Andariya, Archive of Silence, De Balie, Gray Area, the Internet Archive, Khartoon Magazine, Kunstlicht, Medrar, Munyu, Tarkib, Untitled Tbilisi and Witte Rook

How do I join an event?

Easy! When it’s time for the event you would like to attend, simply go to this website.

For the smoothest experience, we recommend joining via Chrome with headphones - this prevents audio feedback when multiple visitors are speaking. Once you arrive at the page, allow your browser to access your microphone and webcam if you'd like to interact with others. Type in a username (this is the name other see), agree to the privacy statement, and hit 'enter show'. Stand close to other visitors and speaking bubbles will spontaneously appear, or enter an audio room to connect. Encounters unfold just as they would in the physical world. See you there :)

Programme:

NOVEMBER 1st 17:00 - 20:00 pm PDT / 01:00 - 04:00 CET (IRL and online)

Internet Archive x Gray Area: Trillionth Webpage Net.Art Commissions

The Internet Archive has reached an extraordinary milestone: the archiving of its trillionth webpage. This civilization-scale achievement marks decades of dedication to preserving the ephemeral nature of digital culture and ensuring universal access to human knowledge. From its founding mission to create a permanent record of the internet's evolution, the Archive has become an essential infrastructure for memory in the digital age, safeguarding 866+ billion webpages, 41+ million books and texts, millions of software programs, images, videos, and audio recordings.

To commemorate this historic moment, San Francisco interdisciplinary arts and technology non-profit Gray Area has partnered with the Internet Archive to commission a series of original net.art works that engage with the vast holdings of the Archive and explore what it means to create, preserve, and access culture online.

NOVEMBER 4th 18:00 - 19:00 CET / 19:00-20:00 CAT / 20:00-21:00 AST / 21:00-22:00 GET (online event)

Reimagining artistic space in times of transition

Join Tarkib, Andariya and Untitled Tbilisi as they open the doors to their spaces. Together, they form a reflection on our relationship to our surroundings and the cultural and societal layers of meaning that may arise from the tangible and geographic, but irrefutably live on in the spaces we carry with us - unfolded from memory, etched into habit, and rebuilt time and again wherever we go.

NOVEMBER 7th 10:00-11:00 PST / 19:00 - 20:00 CET / 21:00 - 22:00 EAT (online event)

Cultural practice beyond the center

Explore exhibitions from Munyu, Kunstlicht, Medrar, and Gray Area x The Internet Archive that reveal collaborative practices at work. Discover how multiple hands and minds sustain spaces where communities gather - and what happens when these ecosystems develop lives of their own.

NOVEMBER 9th 19:30-21:10 CET (IRL and online)

Evening at De Balie in Amsterdam: Artistic resistance in the age of big tech

This evening curators, journalists and artists from Georgia, Sudan, Germany and the United States share their experiences through the online platform Distant.Gallery. What can the Dutch art world take along from their case-studies? What are the needed conditions to preserve and sustain art practices when both the physical and digital realms are co-opted, collapsed or rendered hyperreal?

Following these international perspectives, we turn to voices from Dutch arts funding organisations to reflect on the Netherlands’ cultural infrastructure within a global context. We ask whether private funding becomes necessary when the state, conflict, or media threaten artistic or academic freedoms.

Tickets for the physical event