Aven Le Zhou

More-than-Harmonious   In the face of the Anthropocene crisis, what kind of world should we world? Donna Haraway rejects simplistic solutions, urging us to “stay with the trouble.” Reacting to this call, More-than-Harmonious is an interactive artwork that immerses participants in a real-time, embodied worlding experience, synthesized through customized AI technologies. Caption: More-than-Harmonious (was entitled Negative Shanshui) Exhibited at Ars Electronica Festival 2024. The gaze of the immersent gradually transforms the observed shanshui into a dynamic, multimodal worlding experience embracing the complex relationality. More-than-Harmonious integrates multisensory engagement with AI-generated content, animations, audio, and text to craft a dynamic worlding experience spanning virtual and physical realities. Real-time gaze-driven animation and audio are presented to the immersant in VR and synchronized for bystanders. After each engagement, More-than-Harmonious reverses the transformation and saves the immersant’s animation as a video archive for replay, reflecting on immersive experiences while inspiring bystanders to participate. Caption: Participants with More-than-Harmonious at Ars Electronica Festival 2024.

This work encourages both immersants and bystanders to raise a profound awareness of and connection to the complex relationality of all beings, opening possibilities to stay with the trouble.

Artist Bio Aven Le Zhou is an artist-scholar whose practice-based research navigates the tensions between techno-chauvinism and Luddism, advocating for technodiversity through interactive art. His work critically examines the sociocultural and ecological dimensions of technological advancements, questioning dominant narratives and exploring alternative pathways. His works have been exhibited internationally at venues such as Guangdong Times Museum,Chronus Art Center, Ars Electronica Festival, Digital Art China Exhibition, ISEA Creative Works, Shanghai Duolun Museum of Modern Art and Fouhaus+ Art Space. He has been an Assistant Professor at XJTLU since 2020 and is currently a PhD researcher at HKUST (Guangzhou).