The Kakilang 2025 Commission

Commission

Kakilang (London, UK)

July 4, 2024

XJ receives seed fund from Kakilang for a new video sculpture.

XJ was awarded £3,000 in seed funding for a new artwork from Kakilang, a London-based non-profit arts organisation championing East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) artists and communities. They support work across art forms and empower creatives to develop ambitious, critically-engaged projects that are not reduced to racial identity.

The proposed video sculpture uses satirical images of miniaturized home living inspired by social media parody accounts as a critique of rising living costs and constricting living standards. The work will debut as a part of Kakilang’s 2025 Autumn Season Program).

Interactive projection-mapped installation

Multichannel video sculpture

Xin-1.0.36(2026)

Video

2026

Personhood, Version FourMVR Gallery (Ithaca, NY)Solo Exhibition

Self—ish, a Solo ExhibitionHelix Art Space (Stockholm, Sweden)Solo Exhibition

2025

Silent InterferenceFengling Commercial Building (Taoyuan, Taiwan)Exhibition

AI as an Art MaterialHelix Art Space (Stockholm, Sweden)Talk

Alternative Roots FestivalHoxton Hall (London, UK)Exhibition

Art as an Act of HomemakingBow Arts (London)Talk

Personhood at Speculum ArtiumDelavski dom Trbovlje (Trbovlje, Slovenia)Exhibition

2024

Personhood at Asian Art MuseumAsian Art Museum (San Francisco)Solo Exhibition

Into the FutureWhitespace Gallery (Edinburgh, Scotland)Exhibition

The Kakilang 2025 CommissionKakilang (London, UK)Commission

Technarte ConferencePalacio Euskalduna (Bilbao, Spain)Talk

2023

BEAM at Royal Society of SculptorsRoyal Society of Sculptors (London, UK)Exhibition

CIRCA2023 Public Vote PrizePiccadilly Lights (London, UK)Award

Screening at Piccadilly LightsPiccadilly Lights (London, UK)Screening

Ars Electronica FestivalAtelierhaus Salzamt (Linz, Austria)Exhibition

ART-ACT FestivalTen Square (Singapore)Exhibition

Agawen is the studio practice of J. Aga (PH) and Xin Wen (CN/US). Their collaboration began in London, where they completed a joint postgraduate programme between the Royal College of Art and Imperial College London. They made their artistic debut during a term abroad in Singapore, followed by a UK debut later that year on the Piccadilly Lights, which received the CIRCA Public Vote Prize.

Their current body of work is about how contemporary life is structurally determined by cities and screens, and it draws from their experience as diasporic artists and their technical foundation as design-engineers. Their experimental videos, kinetic sculptures, and immersive installations have been exhibited at the Asian Art Museum (San Francisco, USA), Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria), Helix Art Space (Stockholm, Sweden), and Speculum Artium (Trbovlje, Slovenia).

Formerly XJ.