Lawrence Lek

With a background in electronic music and architecture, Lawrence Lek’s multimedia artistic practice sees him build futuristic, utopian and dystopian virtual worlds with gaming and 3D rendering software. Lek describes himself as a ‘simulation artist’ and terms the vivid digital environments he creates as ‘three-dimensional collages of found objects and situations’. Lek’s work examines technology’s continued infiltration of contemporary society, its effects on the human psyche, and the ethical and moral dilemmas of specific engagements with technology. Through these engagements, the Malaysian-Chinese artist also addresses issues of globalization, xenophobia and climate crisis. Currently, Lek is producing feature-length films to add to his ‘Sinofuturist’ cinematic universe. ...

Sadie Coles HQ is a London-based contemporary art gallery representing around fifty international artists. The gallery opened in 1997, with an inaugural exhibition of new paintings by American painter John Currin presented in parallel with an offsite show by British artist Sarah Lucas, The Law, at St John Street. This pairing established the international breadth of the gallery's programme, which has since expanded over the past two decades. Since its inception, Sadie Coles HQ has operated from a variety of spaces; most recently mounting offsite shows in Los Angeles and Mayfair in 2020 with a significant new video installation by Martine Syms. In September 2013, Sadie Coles HQ opened its largest space at 62 Kingly Street in Soho, as well as a second space at 1 Davies Street in Mayfair designed by 6a Architects in 2015, and a third space at 8 Bury Street in St James’s in April 2021. ...