Victoria Lu’s Journey: Humans and AI Inspire, Story Unfolds

(SeaPRwire) –   BEIJING, May 26, 2026 — Ca’ Foscari University of Venice is set to host a major research exhibition titled “Metamorphosis: Beyond the Real. Searching for Victoria Lu – When Humans and AI Think Together, the Story Begins,” running from May 9 to November 22, 2026. Centered on the five-decade artistic career of Victoria Lu, a pioneering female curator in Asia and a collaborative artist with Phoenix Art, the exhibition investigates the reshaping of human identity, authorship, and cultural legacy in the age of AI. Structured around four primary concepts—Generation, Translation, Recomposition, and Co-writing—the event integrates AI-generated content with human-machine collaboration to explore the evolving relationship between memory and digital technology, highlighting Lu’s continuous artistic development.

Serving as both a retrospective of her career and an active academic investigation, “Metamorphosis: Beyond the Real. Searching for Victoria Lu – When Humans and AI Think Together, the Story Begins” evaluates Lu’s contributions to artistic creation, criticism, and curation. At its heart, the exhibition addresses a vital modern dilemma: the reinterpretation of human agency and cultural legacy in the face of AI. Far from a simple historical review, the event positions Lu as both a historical observer and a forward-looking creator, reassessing curatorial concepts across the past, present, and future amidst rapid technological shifts.

As a cornerstone of the Chinese-language contemporary art world, Victoria Lu is recognized not just as an exceptional artist and curator, but as a key figure who helped shape, transform, and globalize Chinese contemporary art. Consequently, this exhibition transcends a mere personal biography, offering a profound analysis of the cultural and academic movements that have shaped Asian art over the last fifty years.

Born in Taipei in 1951 to a distinguished family of scholars, Lu displayed exceptional artistic promise early on. She began painting at age four, enrolled in college preparatory courses at nine, studied under the renowned Zhang Daqian school at eleven, and presented her debut solo exhibition at thirteen. By seventeen, her 40-meter handscroll was acquired by Taipei’s National Palace Museum. She went on to pursue advanced art education in Belgium and the United States, eventually establishing an avant-garde gallery in California during the late 1970s, which marked the official start of her prominent curatorial journey.

During the early 1980s, she introduced the Chinese translation for the term “curator,” establishing the foundation for a structured curatorial framework in the Chinese art world and deeply inspiring generations of regional artists. Around the turn of the millennium, she co-founded prominent art museums in Shanghai and Taipei, introduced the groundbreaking “Animamix” theory, and foresaw the emergence of urban visual art movements. Throughout her career, she has remained highly active in major art institutions across Taipei, Beijing, and Shanghai, dedicating her efforts to fostering East-West cultural dialogue and elevating Asian contemporary art on the global stage.

Her distinguished career is marked by decades of participation in global art events. She has organized major exhibitions both domestically and internationally, held leadership roles in prestigious global art institutions, curated several collateral events for the Venice Biennale, and initiated the consecutive Metaverse Art Annual in Venice. Recently, she has co-founded AI art initiatives, focusing her efforts on the integration of artificial intelligence in creative practices.

Since she began multimedia curation in 2006, Lu has adapted her artistic philosophy for the AI era, introducing the concept of the “Curategist”—a role combining exhibition curation, narrative design, technological integration, and cultural strategy to foster forward-looking creative models. Her current focus on AI-driven art represents a logical progression of her lifelong interdisciplinary approach and visionary outlook. Guided by keen perception and Eastern humanistic values, she continues to lead the way in artistic innovation.

Running alongside the Venice Biennale, this scholarly exhibition examines how female creators transcend physical limitations in the digital era and investigates the potential for a balanced, symbiotic relationship between humanity and smart technology. The showcase features Lu’s latest collaborative pieces, artistic manifestos, and immersive installations, reflecting on her storied career while welcoming a new creative epoch she identifies as the inaugural year of AI art.

As a historic center for art and contemporary innovation, Venice serves as the perfect venue to bridge Lu’s fifty-year creative path with modern understandings of identity. The exhibition presents a distinct cultural message: the future of art will be shaped by novel dynamics between human memory, physical senses, technology, and collaborative creation.

“Carbon-Silicon Co-writing: The Rong-An Journal,” an ongoing collaborative project by Victoria Lu and AI Curategist Ren Ren, epitomizes this central concept. In this work, AI serves as an active intellectual partner rather than a substitute for human creativity, establishing a sustainable framework for collaborative human-machine thought.

In addition to the main exhibition, the event features a special initiative titled “The Generation of Love: From Hengqin to Venice — A 72-Hour AI Art Moving-Image Co-Creation Project.” Co-organized by several prominent artists and academics, this project invites leading creators to explore the core meaning of life and art in the age of AI.

Under the curatorial leadership of chief curator Angelo Maggi and co-curator Professor Fei Jun, the exhibition brings together seminal works and intergenerational collaborative projects. Through its four-part narrative structure and diverse human-machine experiments, it establishes a distinctive creative environment that bridges history and the future, human recollection and digital logic.

Organization: Phoenix Art

Contact: Zhoubin

Email Address: Zhoubin@Phoenixtv.com

Official Website: http://art.ifeng.com

Phone Number: 010-65207681

Location: Beijing