select projects as producer, live events & installations

BLKNWS in-residence

June - August 2024

The Music Center. Los Angeles, CA

BLKNWS in-residence was a residency program expanding on the original two-channel video installation and precursor to filmmaker Kahlil Joseph's highly anticipated feature film BLKNWS: Terms and Conditions, produced in collaboration with A24 and Participant Media. In addition to BLKNWS, Kahlil is known for directing videos for Beyonce, Kendrick Lamar, and FKA Twigs and as creative director of the Underground Museum.

BLKNWS Bookstore and Reference Library (2024)

The BLKNWS Bookstore and Reference Library was an installation on the Jerry Moss Plaza featuring books for sale curated by Reparations Club, and a retail wall curated by Union Los Angeles. Guests were also encouraged to read freely from an exclusive collection of books donated from the personal libraries of BLKNWS, including Noah Davis, Cathy Opie, Spike Lee, Melodie McDaniel, and Arcana Books for the Arts (to name a few).

BLKNWS Comedy Night (2024)

BLKNWS Comedy Night transformed the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion’s Founders’ Room into the legendary Garvey Lounge for an unforgettable evening of laughter. Hosted by comedian Alzo Slade, the event featured standout performances by Amberia Allen, Peter Kim, Zainab Johnson, Shapel Lacey, and Aida Rodriguez. With a dynamic lineup of some of the best stand-up comics on the scene, this free event delivered an unforgettable night of humor and entertainment.

Read the Garden, hosted by Reparations Club (2024)

Read the Garden offered a relaxing and communal reading experience in The Garvey Garden on Jerry Moss Plaza. Hosted by Reparations Club, this free event invited guests to borrow, bring, or buy a book of their choice and enjoy quiet reading or lively discussion in a welcoming outdoor space. Attendees were encouraged to bring anything that would make them feel at home, from extra pillows to blankets, and enjoy a relaxed evening with books, conversation, and refreshments.

The Garvey Garden (2024)
The Garvey Garden transformed Jerry Moss Plaza at The Music Center into a vibrant, free-to-access summer oasis. Open daily, this expansive green space offered a welcoming environment for guests to lounge, learn, gather, and dance, bringing a lively touch of nature to downtown Los Angeles. The garden provided a space for community connection and relaxation, inviting all to experience art, culture, and leisure in the heart of the city.

Black Bar Social

May 2024 -

Dorothy Chandler Pavillion. Los Angeles, CA

Black Bar Social is a monthly immersive experience and speakeasy-style social gathering designed to spark public imagination and start conversations about the future of Los Angeles. The price of admission is simply to receive a provocation from the provocateur of the evening. An artist, culture maker, or community partner will design a creative immersive experience for attendees that should give them a peek at the cutting-edge innovations of our time in science, technology, emergent culture, social movements, and the possibility of greater well-being. It is a place to socialize big ideas and, in some cases, make decisions and build relationships that bring those ideas to life in Los Angeles.

Nami developed the program in collaboration with transmedia producer Kamal Sinclair, Sr. Director of Digital Innovation at the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles, as Digital Innovation Fellow at the institution.

See resident artists below (video recaps are linked for each):

A TecLeimert Prospective ft. the Afrokosmic Arc of Ben Caldwell

an immersive event celebrating technology, culture, and innovation. Highlights included AI-driven music, immersive gaming, and The Leimert Park Phone, an interactive installation inspired by Ben Caldwell’s legacy, allowing attendees to contribute messages to the Leimert Park community. The event explored the intersection of art, technology, and Black futures, showcasing TEC Leimert’s role in bridging the digital divide in South Los Angeles.

Lauren Lee McCarthy’s Host

an immersive performance that explored the intersection of hospitality, human connection, and AI. Guests were given earpieces that fed instructions from an AI, prompting them to engage with each other while questioning what it means to be a "host" in a digital age. The performance blurred the lines between guest and performer, creating a thought-provoking experience on presence, consciousness, and technology’s role in shaping social interactions.

Alex Rivera’s Artificial Intelligence & The Rasquache Realm

AI x Rasquachismo explored the intersection of artificial intelligence and Chicano cultural ingenuity. This immersive event featured new films, exclusive prints, and holograms, sparking dialogue about AI’s potential and risks. The Dorothy Chandler Pavilion was transformed into a sci-fi cumbia cantina with live soundscapes by DJ Ganas, setting the stage for participatory discussions on technology’s societal impact. Curated by filmmaker Alex Rivera, the evening blended cultural reflection with cutting-edge exploration, challenging guests to rethink the role of technology in shaping the future.

Sultan Sherieff‘s Dancing with the Ancestors

an innovative AR performance by Sultan Sharrief, exploring ancestral themes through movement and custom AR masks. The event included dance workshops connecting participants to their roots, an interactive worldbuilding session, and collaborative exercises focused on generative AI and decentralized technology. Guests also enjoyed somatic healing sessions, volumetric recording, and an AI Photo Booth, creating an immersive experience at the intersection of digital art, personal growth, and social impact.

Mashinka Firunts Hakopian‘s The One Who Looks at the Cup

an event blending the ancient practice of Armenian coffee cup reading with cutting-edge technology. The event featured the training of an AI model in the ancestral art of divination, using readings from Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA) communities, alongside oral histories focused on liberatory futures. By incorporating both Armenian and English datasets, the AI generated bilingual outputs, honoring LA's diasporic linguistic diversity. The experience explored the intersection of ancestral knowledge and emerging technologies, envisioning collectively authored futures.

Bloomscapes

with Music Off the Walls, March - May 2024

Jerry Moss Plaza. Los Angeles, CA

Created by PANDAKERO under the creative direction of EyeJack's founder and renowned digital artist Sutu, "Bloomscapes" is an AR sculpture showcasing a flock of abstract sound creatures which take over the skies while emanating a serene soundscape throughout the plaza. Visitors to The Music Center can also engage with the AR sculpture by amplifying their interaction on the Jerry Moss Plaza large screens.

Music off the Wall: An EyeJack Experience was a gallery bringing musical experiences to life from a flat image on the wall. Each piece offers a unique combination of animation, musical genre, tone and potential affinities or intentional discord. The combination of works provokes questions like: Is this the next innovation of the music video? Is this the next way we connect to micro-music forms, like those abundant in social media, as computing technology goes spatial? This was an exhibition of The Music Center’s Digital Innovation Initiative with EyeJack in-residence.

Indiecade Night Games

November 2023

Indiecade & The Music Center. Los Angeles, CA

Nami collaborated on curating and orchestrating IndieCade Night Games, an evening dedicated to celebrating the vibrant world of independent video games. This unique event with IndieCade Festival showcased a carefully selected lineup of indie games, each pushing the boundaries of creativity and innovation. Attendees were immersed in an atmospheric setting where they could directly engage with developers, explore interactive installations, and experience the diverse spectrum of indie gaming at its finest. IndieCade Night Games epitomizes the spirit of independent game development, fostering a community-driven atmosphere that celebrated creativity, diversity, and the boundless possibilities of interactive entertainment.

Anansi Radical Conflux

September 2023

Leimert Park. Los Angeles, CA

Nami faciliated workshops for Anansi Revolutionary Collective’s Conflux, in which participants in Los Angeles and Nairobi co-created music via teleperformance. The Los Angeles satellite took place as an exhibit in TEC Leimert’s Black to the Future Conference 2023. A radical remote/hybrid collaboration process, confluxes at their core emphasize process over product. It uses a variety of virtual tools for artists to teach each other new skills in real time, including but not limited to:

Gather.Town: a web-conferencing platform that allows a number of people to operate together or split into smaller rooms.
Various DAWs: BandLab, Ableton, Studio One, Pro Tools, or any other major DAW. This provides the highest quality audio and control from the source, and gives a lot of room for experimentation and programming.
Sonobus as a low-latency media transfer, that sends audio and MIDI over a private network. This is what allows multiple spaces to work togeher simultaneously at low-latency, which is vital for Confluxes that spread across various time-zones.
ZeroTier as a private network tool to connect all devices directly, and further lower latency that would be encountered over normal networking. This also gives us the freedom to have whatever network configuration we desire.
Figma as an interactive design tool to map the Conflux plan and interactions. While any design tool works, we prefer to use Figma as part of our design process.

FLUX (April 2022) | New York, NY

was a panel and art exhibition featuring New York-based artists organized with the Columbia University chapter of APAHM, or Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. As Arts & Social Activism Chair of Columbia Uni. APAHM, Nami led the programming of the activation.