Uma Breakdown
I’m Uma, a disabled artist, writer, and award winning game designer interested in animals, horror, and queer feminist literature. Everything I make is about some combination of love, grief, hallucination, and an excess of joy. My practice is orientated around images and text, manifesting as animation, drawing, games, and publishing. With Belladonna Paloma I make video games about the divine and occult providence of transfemme existence. I live in Gateshead, UK.
ㅡ Select recent and upcoming exhibitions |
2024 Earth A.D. 3 QUAD, Derby. (Forthcoming touring solo exhibition and digital artwork 2022-2024) Doppelgänger Rooms Periphery Space, Gorey, County Wexford. (Forthcoming collaborative project w/ artist Olivia Normile) DIY OR DIE Container, Bristol. (forthcoming digital artwork w/ Bella Paloma) Taking up Space The Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle. (Group exhibition) Areas Of Effect: Planar Systems, Critical Roles, and Gaming Imaginaries Arebyte, London. (Group exhibition ) Peasants Revolt Now! Prayer Room, Birmingham. (Group exhibition ) Shape Open London. (Group Exhibition) 2023 Earth A.D. 2 FACT, Liverpool. (Touring solo exhibition and digital artwork 2022-2024) The Well of Sickness Shimmering Overkill Festival, Amsterdam. (Digital artwork w/ Bella Paloma) Take Care Travelling Gallery, Edinburgh/throughout Scotland. (Group exhibition) Joy of Destruction Backlit, Nottingham. (Group exhibition ) Elan Vitale Container, Bristol. (Digital artwork) Out of Scale Transmedialle, Berlin. (Group exhibition ) 2022 Allied Editions Frieze, London. (Art fair) Hinterlands Baltic, Gateshead. (Group exhibition) Earth A.D. Wysing, Cambridge. (Touring solo exhibition and digital artwork 2022-2024) How to Practise Grieving in Eight Movements Klosterruine, Berlin. (Group exhibition) Surface of Scum MAYK, Bristol. (Digital artwork w/ Bella Paloma) 2021 Animal Agency 17th Athens Digital Art Festival, Athens. (Digital exhibition) Take The Moonlight by The Tail Arebyte, London. (Digital artwork) Lich Way Party Train Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge. (Digital artwork) Rhizodome Gwenba.com. (Digital group exhibition) Unfolding Shrines Shape Arts, London. (Augmented Reality group exhibition) Post-Doom Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart. (Digital artwork) 2020 Animal Agency FACT, Liverpool. (Digital artwork) All Flesh is Grass Kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga. (Group collaborative exhibition and role playing game) 2019 Polymorph Other Queens Hall Arts Centre, Hexham. (Group exhibition) 2018 Broken Diorama Dublin Digital Radio. (Radio play) Paperworks SERF, Leeds. (Performance) Sex and Other States South Kiosk, London. (Performance and group exhibition) Polymorph Other IMT Gallery, London. (Group exhibition) Its Origins are Indeterminate The Whitechapel Gallery, London. (Performance) The Inhuman Ecstacy of Toxic Waste Wormworm.org (digital commission) 2017 Creature of Havoc SERF, Leeds. (Solo project) Waste: A Symposium Birkbeck College, London. (video installation) Janusware: Cycle 2 Res. London. (Group exhibition) Janusware: Cycle 1 Res. London. (Solo exhibition and performance) Heretics #12 Rádio Quântica (Radio play) 2016 Green Fuzz Xero, Kline & Coma, London. (Two person exhibition w/ Alfie Strong) (It's All) Tropical Presents Blind Date The Royal Standard, Liverpool. (Performance w/ Alfie Strong) The Dying Midwest of Thulsa Doom Chisenhale Studios, London. (Performance)
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ㅡ Education |
Northumbria- Sunderland Consortium/ PhD September 2016- March 2020, Newcastle AHRC funded PhD based in the art department of Northumbria University, title “Becoming Ahuman: making it desirable to abandon certainty, including certainty of the self and play in this chaotic situation”. Royal College of Art/ MA September 2006- July 2008, London Sculpture school. Funded by RCA fees and maintenance bursary, and award from The Coates Foundation. University of East London / First Class BA (hons) September 2006 - July 2008, London Fine Art department. |
ㅡ Select memberships, residencies, fellowships:
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2024 2024 International Digital Fellow Quad, Derby. Trustee Broken Grey Wires, Liverpool 2023 Shortlisted for The Arts Foundation Award: Digital Art The Arts Foundation, Manchester. 2022 Unseen Futures Fellow Abandon Normal Devices, Manchester. Digital Residency with Alice Rekab Arcade-Campfa, Cardiff. Access Steering Group Member Wysing Arts Centre 2021 Digital Solitude Assembly Residency Arc Bucharest. Access Advisory Group Member FACT, Liverpool Net//Work Residency British Council / Wysing Art Centre, Cambridge. Post-Doom Residency Akademie Solitude, Stuttgart. 2020 Shortlisted for Adam Reynolds Award Shape Arts, London Fact Together Fellowship FACT, Liverpool. 2017 Crip Theory Residency Wysing Art Centre, Cambridge. 2016 Work/Leisure Residency Abingdon Studios, Blackpool. |
ㅡ Recent publications | 2004 “The Dolls and The Egg” Collaborative text with Belladonna Paloma in “Almanac Journal of Trans Poetics”. 2023 “Trans Death Magic” Exhibition text for Slug Town, Newcastle. “Middlesbrough Art Week 2023” Review in “Corridor8”. “The Graveyard of Extension” in “Deleuzine Vol. 2”. “Uma Breakdown and Johanna Hedva talk LA Noir” Two part podcast series at “Unseen Futures Kinopio”, Abandon Normal Devices, Manchester. “Two Plus Two Makes Four: The Auxiliary, Middlesbrough” Review in “Corridor8”. “The Speculative Dismemberment of Agent Leon Kennedy” In “A Wet and Heavy Noise”. Market Gallery, Glasgow. 2022 “Waste Work” In “TEXTUR Issue 4”. Textur, Berlin. 2021 “Appropriate Technology” In artist Holly White’s publication “Leaving Biosphere 2”. CCA, Glasgow. 2020 "Oh_The _Guilt_Puss_3" In “Chain/Mail Issue 1: North East”. Corridor8 “As Plain as its Meaningless Name” In “On Care”. Ma Bibliothèque, London. “Dungeons & Disaster” In “Online Resources”. NewBridge Project, Newcastle. 2019 “Widening Circles” In “The Graveside Orations of Carl Einstein”. Ma Bibliothèque, London “Horse Bites Fence” Co-editor w/ Elena Colman and Rebecca Bligh of this Arts Council England funded publication concerning art, disability, and radical solidarity. 2018 “Gauge Fanfic” In “The Bodies that Remain”. Punctum Books, Santa Barbara. “Axpansion” In “PaperWork Issue 3: Iilwimi lipsing”. Paperwork, London “Farmer 9” In “Alembic”. Res., London. 2017 “Interview” In “Lossy Ecology”. Flat Time House, London. |
ㅡ Recent teaching, workshops, conference papers, artist talks. |
2024 “Tartarus in Bloom”. Public talk with Dr Amy Hale and Belladonna Paloma, at Quad, Derby. “Undertale Delete”. Guest lecture at SODA, Manchester Metropolitan University. “Relics”. Public talk with Joseph Buckley, Dr Karen Di Franco and Dr Alice Rekab, at FACT Liverpool. “Syllabus VII Artist Advisor”. Syllabus Artist development programme, Wysing Arts Centres, Eastside Projects, New Art Exchange, PS2, Spike Island, TACO, Studio Voltaire.. 2023 “A Knife Made of Refuse”. Public talk at The Center for Discursive Inquiry at CalArts, Santa Clarita. “Forest of Doom 2” Workshop for “2023 Youth Festival”, Wysing Arts Centre. “Uma Breakdown and Johanna Hedva”. Public talk at FACT, Liverpool. “Secret passages and arcane puzzles for the contemporary studio”. Workshop for “Into The Wild” artist development programme at Chisenhale Gallery, London. “My Coffin is a Spaceship” Public talk with Evelyn Wh-ell for “Art/Work Association”, at Auto-Italia South East, London. “Put Your Controller on the Floor” Guest lecture delivered at Reality Check Festival, Enschede “Associate Lecturer in Fine Art” Newcastle University, Newcastle. “Hellbound Hearts or, “I was rooting for Mephistopheles, and contemptuous of Faust” Guest lecture and seminar, Yale University, Newhaven.. “Esprit de corps / Corpse Explosion” Guest lecture delivered at Ruskin School of Art, University of Oxford, Oxford. “Art as a Road Trip Workshop delivered at Ruskin School of Art, University of Oxford, Oxford. 2022 “Art as a Monster that Always Comes Back” Guest lecture delivered at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge. “An Anthology of Dead Ends” Guest lecture delivered at University of Huddersfield. “Uma Breakdown in Conversation with Angela YT Chan and Dr. Tom Dillon” live online event for Wysing Arts Centre. “Worldbuilding and Wellbeing” Panel member for “Peer to Peer UK/HK”, Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong, and QUAD, Derby. “Forest of Doom” Workshop delivered at “2022 Youth Festival”, Wysing Arts Centre. “Art as a Road Trip” Workshop delivered at “Jerwood Art FACT Fellowship”, FACT, Liverpool. “Theft and System” Workshop delivered at University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield. "Practice Based Art PhD Methodologies" Workshop delivered at Reading University, Reading. 2022 “Art as Waking up to a Nightmare” Workshop delivered at "Horror Programme", University of The Underground, Berlin. "Art as a Road Trip" Workshop delivered at "AMPlify", Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge. "Open Screen Panel Discussion" Panellist for "Arebyte Open Screen", Arebyte Gallery London. "Art as a Road Trip" Workshop delivered at "FACT Together", FACT Liverpool. "They Played us Like a Damn Fiddle" Workshop delivered at "TROUBLE IN OUTER HEAVEN: PORTABLE OPS PLUS", Southwark Park Galleries. “Dungeon Mechanics” Workshop delivered at "Feminist Painting School", Baltic, Gateshead. “Broken Vibes” Artist talk delivered at "Merged Futures 3", Northampton University. 2020 “Lead Maker” International Centre for Life, Newcastle. 2019 “Biofilm Mansion Theory, or Making as Collaboration with Disorder” Conference paper delivered at “Interdisciplinary Conversations Around Making”, Newcastle University. “Coming Soon, From Your Cemetary: Horror / Play / Instability / Desire” Guest lecture delivered at Reading University. “There is no reason for you to live: ‘No World Dreamers, Sticky Zeitgeist episode 2: Aperitif’ as trans* Écriture Féminine” Conference paper delivered at “Beyond the Console: Gender and Narrative Games”, London South Bank University, London. “Research Assistant to Prof. Patricia McCormack” Three month AHRC funded placement. 2018 “Smeared into The Environment: Queer Horror and The Ahuman” Conference paper delivered at “Horror, Cult, Exploitation II”, Northumbria University. “Alembic II: Chrominance” Panellist for publication launch, Res. Gallery, London. “Wild Pop: A Symposium” Artist talk at Newcastle University. “Smeared into The Environment: Queer Horror and The Ahuman” Conference paper delivered at “Don't Look: Representations of Horror in the 21st Century Symposium”, University of Edinburgh. “Biofilm Assemblages and Ahuman Horror” Conference paper delivered at “Current Research in Speculative Fiction”, University of Liverpool. “The Revolutionary Praxis of Urban Galls” Conference paper delivered at “Open Graves Open Minds & Supernatural Cities present: The Urban Weird” University of Hertfordshire. 2017 “Appropriation” Taught semester long module on BA Fine Art programme, Northumbria University. “Dog-Tech 1” Conference paper delivered at “CDT Conference”, Baltic Gateshead. |
ㅡ Select awards and funding |
2022 North East Artist Fund North East CVAN Trailblazer Fund Bristol + Bath Creative R+D 2021 Develop Your Creative Practice Bursary Arts Council England 2nd prize for “Animal Agency” Athens Digital Art Festival Audience Award, 2020 ArtsAdmin Bursary |
ㅡ Select press and interviews
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2023 “Uma Breakdown: Earth A.D. 2” Corridor8 “Save Room” Container “An Interview with Uma Breakdown” Art in Liverpool 2021 “Free Your Mind. Death Will Come, Uma Breakdown in Conversation with Johanna Hedva” akademie-solitude.de “Unfolding Shrines is some of the most ambitious augmented reality art we have seen in the last year” The Art Newspaper “The best virtual things to do at home in April” TimeOut 2020“In Conversation: Uma Breakdown and Lesley Taker” Fact.co.uk 2019“Art, The Anthropocene, and the Grim Dark Future of Warhammer 40k” Roman Road Journal 2016“(It’s All) Tropical present Blind Date” Corridor8 “Review: Blind Date: (it’s all) Tropical at The Royal Standard” Art in Liverpool
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