Mentor Profile: Antonio Roberts

How would you describe yourself?

I am an artist, musician, and curator based in Birmingham.

What do you enjoy about offering Axis members critical friend conversations?

I really enjoy just listening to artists and allowing them to shape the conversation. Some artists want to talk about their practice more broadly, whereas others might be more interested in getting feedback on a specific project or artwork.

Although the conversations are short, I try to offer a fresh outside perspective.

Are there particular areas relating to the visual arts profession that you feel you could help with as a mentor?

My specialist area is in creating and curating digital artworks, which I have been doing since 2010. Digital art is a very broad term which can include performance, music, installation, sound art, moving image, and even sculpture.

As a mentor I definitely aim to be of use to those who already engage with digital technology, but I also want to provide guidance to those who are interested in adopting it into their own practice. This could be a painter that is considering how VR could add a new dimension to their work, a musician who wants to learn live coding to create algorithmic patterns, or any artist who wants to get a grasp on sharing their wok online.

What is it about (these areas) that feels the most interesting to you right now?

I think it's interesting to see the broader adoption of digital and technology-based practices. When I started my practice in 2010 support for digital art was limited, and I often felt like I had to educate institutions on how to exhibit digital artworks in addition to creating the artwork itself!

Now, though, there is a lot more widespread knowledge and institutional support. Even Arts Council England recently announced that they are recognising digital art as its own art form.

It's interesting to see artists from all art forms experimenting with different technologies and seeing how/if it can work with their existing practices.

How would you describe what you can offer artists, as a mentor?

As a mentor I think the most beneficial thing I can do is listen and offer guidance. In relation to digital art, there are so many different technological solutions to even the simplest of tasks (e.g. playing a video) that it can be difficult to know where to start.

I can draw on my own experience of exhibiting digital artworks to guide artists on which solutions to use or suggest areas that they might want to explore.

I also have a lot of exeprience in curating and creating performances, moving image works, and anything involving digital media, so I can advise on those aspects of any practice.

Which organisations have you worked for? How long have you been working in the arts, and / or as part of an organisation?

I have been working professionally in the arts since around 2010 as an artist and curator, and more recently a musician.

I was a curator at Vivid Projects where I led the Black Hole Club artist development programme until 2019.

I am currently a trustee of Site Gallery and I was previously a trustee for Birmingham Open Media, VIVID, and Fierce Festival. I was on a-n's Artist Council from 2019-2022, and was an Artist Advisor for Jerwood Arts from 2019 - 2023.

I have been a judge on prizes and programmes from institutions and galleries including: Jerwood Arts, The Photographers' Gallery, Koestler Arts, a-n, Ctrl Shift Network, The Arts Foundation, FACT, and MediaFutures.

What are one or two challenges you have faced as an artist and how have you worked to overcome them?

A recent challenged I faced was finding the confidence to try new things in my practice. Early in my career I was well-known for creating glitch art (art made through errors) and 3D animations. I definitely enjoyed this but I also wanted explore other more traditional methods of film and image making. However, I felt immense pressure to have any new venture match the quality of my existing work.

In 2020 I was fortunate to do a "Stay at Home" residency with New Art Gallery Walsall. I was encouraged by the curators there to try new things and so I used this as an opportunity to try traditional film making techniques (within the confines of my home of course!). The curators gave me lots of encouragement and guidance and I felt pleased with the results!

I am also returning to my practice after a few years of reduced activity due to illness. I'm also now definitely a mid career artist and so I am reflecting on my past practice and thinking about how to sustain it going forward.  What has helped in this regard is to take stock of everything that I have achieved. This has meant looking back over old artworks, reading old journals and sketches. This has helped to reinvigorate my ideas and prove to myself that I still have plenty to offer and create.

Would you like to share a few things you are working on right now, or anything you have coming up?

I am currently focused on my Ode to the Midlands commission with CVAN East/West Midlands and Film and Video Umbrella which will see me create a new digital artwork about the Midlands. 

I am also learning game development with a view to use that as a narrative storytelling device. 

Finally, I am releasing two EPs of new music made with code (live coding). One of them is with my collaborative duo, badcirculation, and the other is a solo endeavour.

Antonio Roberts is an artist, musician and curator based in Birmingham, UK. His practice is concerned with how the misuse of digital technology impacts people of colour and other marginalised groups. His recent work focuses on the depiction of Black people in digital media, ranging from stereotypical misrepresentations in early video games to modern algorithms and AI codifying existing biases.

His (Algo|Afro) Futures mentoring programme teaches live coding software as a way to address how Black people have been under/mispreresented in digital art and electronic music, despite being pivotal to its development. He is currently learning game development, with the aim to explore how immersive environments can be used as a narrative storytelling device. He is also working on his debut EP, created using a combination of live coding software and hardware synthesisers.

We aim for these Critical Friend Conversations to be held in a space free from judgement, requiring both participants to be fully present and ready to listen. Conversations offer reciprocal benefits and are made even more valuable by continued engagement in the Axis Community, our dedicated online platform for members. 

But don’t just take our word for it! Here's what some members have said about their experience Here