Kamila B. Richter

Kamila B. Richter (born 2 May 1976 in Olomouc) is a Czech-German media artist. Richter lives and works in Düsseldorf and Karlsruhe. From 2000 to 2002 she lived in Durban and Johannesburg in South Africa and studied at the Technikon Natal, Durban. Previously, in 2001, she achieved the title of Master of Fine Arts and later, in 2010, the title of Doctor of Philosophy at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague.
Life.
As a programmer of the early web era (0-System, web project reflecting the medium of the web, 1997 and M-System, participatory web game project, 1998) Kamila B. Richter is rendering the data streams visible which surround us on a daily basis (Emporium Spirit, New York Stock Exchange visualization, 2005, Black Vortex, Prague Stock Exchange visualization, 2006, and others) and gives rise to the strings of zeros and ones, which invisibly plough through our daily communication, work and social life in exhibition spaces, where those data streams made visible meander, dislimn and resurge.
Since 2005 - in cooperation with Michael Bielický - she develops web based, often interactive projects, which are controlled by real time data fed from the Internet. Usually market and stock exchange data, news, Twitter and other data sources guide their animated stories - often in an uncanny and counterintuitive way. Most recently in Lost Objects, National Theatre Prague (2015) and Lost, Apollonia, Strasbourg (2016). In 2017 their solo exhibition LOST at the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam in Havana, Cuba ended after the second extension.
Since 2011 Kamila B. Richter uses technically out-dated mobile phones with low-resolution cameras, to capture the nightlife on the streets of European, Asian, South- and North-American cities, usually showing blurred silhouettes of human entities, often captured in backlight atmospheres of technically disintegrated surroundings. Kamila B. Richter is interested mainly in everything mediatised, the machine glare: the depiction of preconscious processes of sight, which our brain has learned to subconsciously construe. For Kamila B. Richter the camera’s blurred limited phase image is the proper reflection of reality. The abstract, mediatised reality as content and old master style oil painting technique, which she layers in weeklong work stages to finish her versions of mediatised streetscapes, materialize the tension of contemporary visual culture.
Kamila B. Richter has participated in numerous international exhibitions, festivals and projects. Her innovative artworks shown worldwide include: Exhibitions on the Internet, Biennale Sevilla, Museum Kunstpalast, Telegrafenamt Vienna, Art Center Nabi Seoul in South Korea, the Künstlerhaus Vienna, the DOX in Prague and the ZKM Museum für Neue Kunst in Karlsruhe.
Kamila B. Richter received the Master of Fine Arts title in 2001 and the Dr. Phil title at the Academy of Fine Arts (AVU) in Prague. She lived in Durban, Johannesburg, South Africa, and studied at the Technikon Natal, Durban. Today she lives and works in Düsseldorf and Karlsruhe.
Exhibitions.
Richter had a group exhibition at 2nd Zlín Youth Salon (2000). And her first billboard projects in the city of Zlín, Czech Republic, titled Pure Love were exhibited as part of the 3rd Zlín Youth Salon (2003). Later she continued with Guerilla public billboard projects in Prague, Czech Republic (2004). Her second major group exhibition was the seminal World as Structure, Structure as Image Exhibition at Gallery At the White Unicorn, Klatovy, Czech Republic in 2003 A retrospective of Richter's work in collaboration with Michael Bielicky was held at the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam in Havana, Cuba. Her first major painting exhibition ended in September 2019. A retrospective of Richter's work in collaboration with Michael Bielicky is held at the ZKM Karlsruhe until march 2020.
Richter's work also appeared in seminal group exhibitions such as Biennale Moscow, Moscow (2011), Havana Biennale, Sevilla (2012), Globale, ZKM (2015) and Open Codes, ZKM (2017).