Artist Profile
INTRODUCING CONNIE BAKSHI
LITERARY INTERPRETATION – FROM CINDIA
THEME IN THE NOVEL: MUSIC (and transformation)
Inspired by Nocturnes, Op. 9: No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Chopin
This mesmerizing piece draws you in with its ever-changing imagery into an organic world of music and transformation. Each phrase reveals fragments in time and changing reflections of memory that repeat until the renewal is complete.
It represents the personal renaissance that Yasmin is going through. This talented young pianist challenged by circumstance is forced to take on an unforseen path. How might she become a musical shapeshifter in her search for who she really is?
Quote from the Novel (about Yasmin):
“Juilliard, the prestigious music school, had turned her down twice, and the disappointment ran deep. That one failed note, she thought to herself, and she sighed when remembering how her fingers had failed her at the keyboard. With that one moment, her dreams had been shattered.
She sat up straight and cleared her throat. If the world of music would not have her now, perhaps it was time to try something different. A new direction, just for a little while, she thought.”
ARTIST’S INTERPRETATION OF SUSPENDED BOUQUET
As a preface, Yasmin’s story especially resonated with me, having been a devoted classical pianist for the first half of my life and then making the difficult decision to step away and start a new direction of my own. There were certain phrases that particularly inspired me in Yasmin’s introduction:
– remembering how her fingers had failed her at the keyboard
– the rhythm of the raindrops
– tastes and aromas intoxicated
– and then resolutely put it away
As I developed the piece, I was keen to convey an introspective journey that captures fragmented memory and its transformation with time and distance. The act of repetition becomes an integral part of the concept and process. Each time a memory is replayed, it dynamically shifts and elaborates on itself — not unlike Chopin’s Nocturne with its rounded binary structure. I sought to mirror this effect through generative AI and a repetitive, recursive process of out-painting that elaborates and expands on prior generations while retaining its memory of an initial image.
The audio track, which I performed and remixed, expresses a different version of repetition — static and unresolved in its melody. Strains of trills and ornamentation echo throughout. It is only when the visual animation takes on an abstract sensorial, almost gustatory, texture that the possibility of resolution is introduced. The audio and animation merge in synchronous closure by the end of the narrative — signaling a punctuation on one chapter as another blooms.
BIOGRAPHY OF CONNIE BAKSHI
Connie Bakshi is an artist based in Los Angeles, trained as a classical pianist and biomedical engineer. She is descended from the ancestral shamans of Taiwan. Working predominantly with artificial intelligence, she probes post-colonial narratives that emerge on the boundaries between the synthetic and organic, material and immaterial, the human and nonhuman. Her works often re-code language, lore, and ritual to unfold the binaries of colonial canon.
Her accolades include the Red Dot: Best of the Best Award for Concept Design and the International Takifuji Arts Award. She has spoken and exhibited internationally, including at FEMGEN at Art Basel Miami, VellumLA, EPOCH Gallery, Feral File, MoCDA, Expanded.Art, NFCastle, and SaloneSatellite in Milan.
Her work and practice have been covered by Outland and Right Click Save. An alumna of the VerticalCrypto Art Residency and NEW INC, the New Museum’s incubator for art, technology, and design, she is currently a resident artist at wild.xyz. Connie holds degrees from Duke University and ArtCenter College of Design.
@conniebakshi is a transmedia artist who blends tech, lore, and ritual to explore what it means to be human in the era of emerging AI. Her first two NFT collections, Ethereal Caress and Birds of Paradise, sold out on OpenSea and reflect an intimate relationship and dialogue with AI.
In Rite of Passage, Connie harnesses AI machine vision to negotiate the relationship between human memory and digital archive, shifting cultural information and representation between different states of reality. The resulting machine permutations are echoes of the originals, connecting human imagination across centuries of time, technology, and culture.
Connie’s previous work includes a generative opera derived from DNA and an LED lighting series based on the ancient craft of Japanese urushi. She won the Red Dot Best of the Best Award for industrial design, the Takifuji Arts Award, has exhibited at SaloneSatellite in Milan, and is an alumnus of NEW INC, New Museum’s incubator for art, technology, and design.
Sign up now to become part of the journey!
#innovate #storytelling #writers #artists #novelexperience #artofstorytelling
