Who Asked for an AI Art Museum?
Plus, a child punctures a Magritte in Israel, and Nayland Blake speaks with Hyperallergic about eroticism, play, and the role of the artist.
The phrase “LA’s new AI art museum” sends a shiver down my spine. But reporter Matt Stromberg, a longtime Angeleno, makes it a compelling subject in his latest dispatch. Harrowingly dubbed Dataland and founded by artist Refik Anadol, the new institution reminded Stromberg of Disneyland and made him feel “a bit like Neo in the Matrix” (derogatory).
In our latest installment of our queer and trans elders interview series, Associate Editor Lisa Yin Zhang speaks with artist Nayland Blake, whose expansive body of work plays with eroticism and tinkers with desire. Pair that illuminating conversation with our list of seven art books about queer and trans art history, past and present, to celebrate the first week of Pride.
—Lakshmi Rivera Amin, associate editor
My Queasy, Forest-Scented Stroll Through LA’s New AI Art Museum
I stepped onto the escalator and descended into a cavernous mirrored space, as dazzling light projections covering the walls, floor, and ceiling morphed into hard-edged cyber-graphics, then branching mycological networks, then color-saturated flowers and trees. A thunderous soundtrack swelled from ambient minimalism to cinematic triumph, peppered with bird chirps and the howls of monkeys. The scent of a damp forest floor wafted through the air, dispersed by a device I wore around my neck. The walls seemed to shift around me, and my heart began racing.
It was exhilarating. It was mesmerizing. I felt like I was going to be sick. | Matt Stromberg
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Dive Into Summer with Hyper SoCal
Discover your new favorite local art destination this summer with Hyper SoCal! From unique neighborhood community centers to innovative contemporary art spaces, Hyper SoCal celebrates creative voices shaping our cultural landscape. Originated at Brand Library & Art Center, this regional initiative spotlights the artists and spaces that help Southern California thrive.
News
- The School of the Art Institute of Chicago has placed the director of its graduate art therapy program, Savneet Talwar, on leave after she assigned students a case study analyzing a hypothetical client who was “deeply affected by the violence against Palestinian civilians.”
- A child punctured a René Magritte painting at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem using a pinecone from its garden.
- A fire that broke out in Long Island City left two Queens artists scrambling to rescue decades of work and look for new studios.
Celebrate Pride Month
Nayland Blake Doesn’t Believe in Fixed Selves
“You have to be a person who champions other work,” they told Hyperallergic, “so that you build the context within which your work can be legible.”
Read More7 Art Books You Should Read This Pride Month
A joint biography of Peter Hujar and Paul Thek, a catalog on Martin Wong’s Chinatowns, Catherine Opie’s portraiture, queer nightlife through the ages, and more.
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ArtPhilly Presents “What Now: 2026”
The five-week city-wide festival will feature over 30 newly-commissioned works created by Philadelphia artists to spark important conversations about the future of the United States.
From Our Critics
Danielle Mckinney’s Portraits of Black Women at Rest
Each figure in her paintings luxuriates in the dreaminess of space belonging to her and her alone. | Channelle Chevelle Russell
Read MoreMember Comment
Don Dugal on "Sanford Wurmfeld's Unstable Geometry"
From the Archive
100 Assignments From Nayland Blake
While these assignments will not turn someone else into me, they will provide the practitioner with a path to the deviations within themselves.
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